Belief Systems

Megan McArdle is a conservative economist/blogger with relatively rational climate skepticism (compared to the usual fact proof crackpots and idiots). You can read her post on the possible phytoplankton die-off. My untrustworthy summary: we might be doomed, probably can't do anything about it, but should have a hefty carbon tax.

Of more interest to me was this comment from aka_scoop:

I won't give serious consideration to the arguments of any eco-doom prophet who does not first demonstrate that he has invested all his money in a way that hedges against that which he professes to expect.

The more extreme the predictions, the more extreme the investment must be. If these guys haven't spent all their money on -- I don't know -- oxygen tanks, canned food, firearms and property on very high ground, they should shut up. Because there's no internally consistent way that a person could actually believe such things while spending their lives blogging from costal cities...

I think that this post very well epitomises the error of logic implicit in the idea that idividual action can create a sensible response to a predicted long term catastrophe. What's my logical "hedge" against world wide eco-catastrophe likely to collapse ecosystems fifty or seventy-years from now, given that I'm already in medicare generation? I won't be alive but my children, and hopefully future grandchildren, could be, so I should invest in trying to persuade the world to avoid the catastrophe. I won't be moving to Vaanuatu, but ought to be secure against sea-level rise here at 3900 feet above sea-level. As far as near term warming, it makes sense to invest in air conditioning - a technology that unfortunatelythreatens to make global warming worse. That's the problem - individuals, trying to optimize their personal results, collectively destroy the ecosystem upon which we all depend.

This scenario has played out again and again in human history, but never before on a global scale. The best way to hedge against the catastrophe is to keep whacking the knuckleheads between the eyes and hope that enough of them finally get a clue.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Anti-Libertarian: re-post

The most pointed critique of social security and liberalism in general is the libertarian critique. The problem with libertarians, for a liberal, is that we have too much in common. We both believe in individual rights, tolerance of individual differences, and dislike government prescription of religion. The basic difference, it seems to me, is the different answers we give to Cain's (with thanks to the Captain - my original version had the corpse asking the question!) famous question: "Am I my brother's keeper?" That's not really my basic bitch against the libertarians though. My real complaint is the same as my complaint against most religion - its premise is a fraud. For those who can't stand to wait for the punchline, I believe that trying to implement libertarian principles leads to tyranny or social disintegration. Demonstrating that takes some historical (and pre-historical) context. For all but the last 15,000 or so of the 100,000 years the human spec...
Read more

Uneasy Lies The Head

Uneasy lies the head that wears a crown ........... Shakespeare Henry IV, Part II. So it is with us and our slightly distant primate cousins , so it seems. A 9-year study of wild baboons in Kenya by Princeton University and the Institute of Primate Research may turn conventional assumptions of alphas males upside down. The study found that alpha males have high testosterone levels, which allows them to dominate other baboons, get access to more food, and attract better mates. This is expected. Surprisingly, though, the alpha males also have high levels of stress hormone glucocorticoid, which scientists measured from their feces samples. In fact, the stress of alpha baboons was on par with low-ranking baboons. The convention wisdom is that access to food and females provides life security and thus less stress for dominant males. Conversely, weak males who are constantly threatened by starvation and physical violence from stronger males are thought to be more stressed. The st...
Read more

We Call it Soccer

The US played its best, and maybe only good game of World Cup, but lost thanks to brilliant goalkeeping by the Swedish keeper and the bizarre method soccer uses to settle ties when three US stars could not put the ball on frame from the 12 yard spot.  At the end it came down to a blocked shot that spun in by maybe a couple of centimeters. Well, that's football - too much like life.   Which brings me to a modest proposal.  Replace the thirty minute overtimes with as many 7-player 15 minute periods as needed to settle it.  Scoring should be much easier with fewer players.
Read more