Clean Water For Africa?

I've posted before that I am a skeptic not just of "global warming" but also, and more importantly, of the debate behind the topic.  Now, two Canadian scientists are trying to shed more light on both problems.  At its core, you have disingenuous people pushing theories that are not fact.  The media finds a drama to sell and pushes it.  Politicians see a way to get ahead, and we are off. 

One technique of the pro-warming group is to assert that "all credible scientists agree" on global warming and its source.  This paints dissenters as fringe wackos.  But, it is not true.  Also, what if there is a scientific explanation for the warming, such as a change in the sun?  If that is true, then the planet is warming but it is not by human hands.  That is, essentially, what the scientists in this article are explaining.  It is worth a look.

Why does any of this matter?  Well, two reasons.  First, we cannot base public policy--which has serious economic and behavioral ramifications--on the same grounds as choosing the prom queen:  popularity with the 'in' crowd.  Second, combating global warming by shutting down cars and factories costs society wealth--either in lost production (and therefore real people's jobs) or in clean up costs.  That wealth could be used to combat actual--not theoretical--problems in this world:  AIDS, malaria, or cancer.  For a sense of the cost of Kyoto versus the cost of malaria, look at this page (Kyoto) and this page (malaria).  What a tragedy.  As Tim Patterson, of Carleton University in Ottawa, notes: 

All the money wasted on Kyoto in a year could provide clean drinking water for Africa...We're into a new era of science with the discussion of solar forces. Eventually, Kyoto is going to fall by the wayside. In the meantime, I'm worried we're going to spend millions that could have been spent on something better like air pollution.

Dr. Patterson does not simply bury his head in the sand--either by blindly agreeing to the man-made-warming argument, or by denying statistically verifiable warming.  But he asserts that the most up-to-date research is showing warming over the last century is directly tied to changes in the sun's brightness.  I don't think my SUV, Rosie's toilet paper, or your hybrid is going to change that.

Maybe we should then refocus on the science, not the popularity or political correctness of the issue, and see if our money would not be better spent getting clean water in Africa.

Thomas More

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Comments

[Dee]

The hysterical mob mentality of global warming will be our country's economic undoing if our government is suckered into supporting it. Rational, intelligent discourse is water to the soul. Thank you!

[erin]

I appreciate you bringing perspective to this issue. But why Kyoto vs. Malaria? or hybrid tech vs. clean water? I see no mention of the actual biggest cost to America right now - this war we are spending billions on. Not to mention, why the sun's changes vs. carbon emissions? Isn't there room for BOTH? But I believe the bigger question is not choosing one over the other, but that both Malaria and environmental stewardship are things Christians should deeply care about, and should be concerned about the policies effecting all these issues. It's not enough to pit world hunger against "going green" and say, look how we're missing the point. Our country is diverting lots and lots of money to things that have nothing to do with actual needs in the world. NT Wright informs my thoughts on this the most when he talks about how as image bearers we are seeking to renew the whole world - not just the environment or distribution of wealth, etc. As followers of Christ, shouldn't we be encouraging efforts to care for this earth, feed the hungry, provide clean water, provide jobs... all of it? I don't find where caring about these things become mutually exclusive except for within political interest groups.

[Thomas More]

Dee, my concern over this 'debate' is that it is not entirely scientific, or honest. It's like some scientists have gotten a whiff of life as a Hollywood movie star, or DC politician, and love the press. The media hysteria, Hollywood and DC hoopla around the issues is altering the actual science: what do we know, how do we know it, what can we do about it...

As a consequence, you are right, we face the very-real prospect that we will make policy decisions that have economic impact without environmental gain. This would be poor stewardship, which leads to my reply to Erin.

Erin,

I can't analyze the Global Warming debate in the context of the war debate--I'll try one problem at a time. The similarity with both, however, involves the dissonance between media/politicians and proven facts. That said, I'm not saying the war is going well or that the earth isn't warming. I'm saying that we don't have sufficient information to analyze how to fix those problems.

To your specifics, let me ask you: what if hybrid cars caused more pollution than internal combustion engines--just not CO2, emissions? (see, for example, the stories by the WSJ on the environmental damage caused by the nickel used in the batteries in hybrid cars.)

Just because CO2 emissions go down, doesn't mean the overall health of the earth goes up. It might, but we need to look at the whole picture, not just the media-fashionable one, if we want to claim the good-stewardship position rather than the socially popular one. (If you think about it, how many times has Hollywood been right on these sorts of things, anyhow? Remember in the 80's when it was global cooling and the coming ice age?)

On hybrid tech v. clean water, and why it can't be both, the answer is, simply: limited resources. Currently, it costs more to build and operate a hybrid than it does a conventional car. Thus, for the same transportation, you spend (or "burn") more wealth by going hybrid--though in my area of the country, you get a lot of social kudos and attaboys for doing so. That wealth could have otherwise been used on a different project--say a clean water project in Africa. It is not quite that simple, but the point is, allocation of finite resources drives personal and governmental decisions. We can't have everything we'd like, so we must prioritize. The info on global warming costs shows lost wealth as a result of the Kyoto treaty. That wealth could've been spent on something else, but those countries opted for anti-global warming, over spending on malaria prevention/AIDS research/clean water projects. They made a decision, you might agree with it, I might disagree with it. The point is it has real consequences in a world where we can't have it all, all at once.

Therefore, the debate should be over how to best spend our limited resources. As a Christian, I'd advocated serving the least of these most efficiently (the most benefit to the most people, which does not necessarily mean simply increasing governmental spending, by the way.) The least of these could include the environment, I guess, but people will likely always be the highest priority for me. That said, people are in the environment, so we are dealing with a rather complicated balancing act.

I do not think either people or the environment is served by Kyoto (look how much cooling it has caused!)--in fact I believe it has an incredibly perverse effect on the poor (it drives up costs of goods and reduces jobs, which always disproportionately affects the poor over the rich.)

So the answer to your question on shouldn't we be encouraging good efforts is: "Yes, of course." But the harder question is: "how do we best do this?"

Lets say it costs the world $2 Trillion to end the effects of man-made global warming. Now say that same $2 Trillion could wipe out malaria in Africa and provide clean water to 90% of its population.

What would you pick?

Now lets tweak that example a bit. Lets say that the man-made global warming is responsible for only 3% of all global warming, and changes in the sun are responsible for the remaining 97%. Now what do we do?

I think it would be poor stewardship and uncaring to spend the $2 Trillion on the global warming in that case. I can still care about the issue, but I must allocate resources where they can do the most good for the most people. We need to know what we can affect, how much it will cost, and then "count the cost" as to the good we can do.

It is one thing to say we need to care for people and the environment. But I'm concerned that we are not really caring for the environment (because I am not convinced we can cause or fix global warming, as described in the media today) AT THE EXPENSE of the poor. This behavior seems doubly irresponsible.

Also, I think your last sentence: "I don't find where caring about these things become mutually exclusive except for within political interest groups." overstates things quite a bit. I didn't say that I don't care about the environment. I don't, however, agree with a popular notion on how to help the environment. What's more, I think those that do advocate the Kyoto-like policies do so at the peril of the poor. That's not a political-interest-group belief, that's the best I can figure looking at the data we have. We probably both deeply care about these issues, the question is: what are the best policies to achieve our goals? We should try to debate these important topics with out trying to paint the skeptics into a 'political interest group' box, reserving for our own position the moral high ground.

While it is a nifty debate technique--from an emotional-appeal stand point--it doesn't do much to further the discussion, and clouds things with labels. I believe you genuinely believe your position, but would ask you afford me the same belief without a label.

Sorry for the long comment, but you all got me thinking---and that can be dangerous!!

[Thomas More]

P.S. Thanks for commenting! We love having the discussion here at ATT--keep 'em coming!

[Dee]

Thomas,

Completely agree with the lack of honest debate over GW. Gore's theatrics and hystrionics have lowered the standard to that of peddling snake oil.

Personally I do not believe humans are causing global warming simply because of who is behind the fear tactics; the conflict of interest here is Gore's huge potential profit on everyone's fear (I realize I risk sounding like a liberal who refuses to believe ANYTHING Bush says simply because he's Bush). Gore is lining his pockets under the guise of carbon offsets with his Generation Investment Management company, criss-crossing the skies in his personal jet, and spending $30,000 a year on utilities - while the rest of us would be laden under layers of laws governing our transportation and energy. The WSJ did a great piece on this on March 19 of this year.

It's hard to understand how people can be so gullible and not see the greed and ulterior motives. While Kyoto would cripple the U.S. economy, India and China would get complete emission passes. It would create a larger class of the poor in our country and the rest of the world, but politicians would feel smug because they're helping the environment. Ugh.

It's all about power, and Gore and his ilk have found a way to cash in on it.

Erin,

As Christians we should be the best stewards of this earth; there are many ways we all can do our part, but the global warming scare has become a religion of its own, with its own apocalyptic ending. People believe in it without any real science as Thomas More has pointed out, and their faith borders on the fanatical, comparing sceptics to Holocaust deniers. Way too much emotion for me to take this seriously.

[bob]

get to the point

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