Global Warming Logic
 

hxxp://www.break.com/index/tough-to-argue.html

I found this somewhat interesting but I am sure there is something wrong with the logic I just cant figure it out.

One question would be how much you believe in his "extremes". What happens if we go into a global economic depression that makes the 30s look like a cake-walk?

Well, the first and most obvious problem is that "Global (Economic) Depression should be under both "yes" options. The money and resources are still being spent, so the Depression happens either way.

Also, in his "worst case scenario", he assumes that other castastrophes wouldn't happen (Political, Social, etc.) under both "yes" options as well. I mean, a global depression would probably cause at least poltical and social catastrophes as well since hordes of people would try to go where the money is, what little of it there is.

Basically, he doesn't really think out the "yes" column. The results in the "yes"/"False" box should be the same as the "yes"/"True" option, since essentially the same outcome is reached. In the "yes"/False" option, Global Climite Change doesn't happen since humans weren't causing it but we spent all of our money to prevent it, and in the "yes"/"True" option, Global Climite Change doesn't happen because we spent all of our money to prevent it. The end result is the same, GCC doesn't happen and we spent all of our money, so the "worst possible outcome" should be the same for both boxes.

But having said all of that, there are also plenty of other problems with it. For instance, he is assuming that all of the "worst possible" outcomes all have the same chance of occuring. The only way using a logic chart in this way makes sense is if all possible outcomes for all 4 options had the same chance of occuring.

I think that was what I was leaning towards as my biggest problem with this the more I thought about it. Obviously there will be alot of grey area in the other parts. It would be interesting to assign probabilities to everything and see what comes up.

He didn't stop at the one video. He is continuing to meet objections in other videos on his Youtube site:

hxxp://www.youtube.com/profile?user=wonderingmind42

Videos 2 and 3 address some of the points mentioned in this thread already.

What if the oil runs out before global warming becomes an economic/political/social catastrophe?

If the answer to that is Oil is infinite (or excessive), for the short term, we really need to rely on our own sources of oil in the gulf, Texas, Canada, and Alaska and let the middle east rot.

Oh, and if the populated coastlines flood over the course of the next 100 years, those people don't drown. They move. Just saying.

I just watched the third one, "Patching Holes #3, the Man-Pollo project, with explosions" and it made me laugh out loud. I know it's a serious topic, and I do take it seriously, but that guy is funny.

The problem is that he presented his first video as, in his own words, a "silver bullet argument". And then he admits that it's full of holes? He said he anticipated all of the objects? Well then, that wouldn't be a "silver bullet", would it?

But his reasoning for not having the "Global Depression" in the "yes"/"True" box is flawed. He's saying that, due to human psychology about doing something good, would lower the chance of it happening. You have GCC not happening and us with no money. What you don't have is knowlegde of the cause. If GCC doesn't happen, how do we know that we were causing it if spend our money to stop it? Think about it, we spend our money and resources to stop GCC and it doesn't happen. How do we know our action stopped it? There's no way to know (well, the scientists might but no one listens to them ;) ). So the end result of "yes"/"False" and "yes"/True" is still the same, no GCC, no money and not knowing if our actions stopped it.

But to go back to the original point, he presented this as a silver bullet and now he's making videos to address the objections, most of his "addressing" is essentially agreeing with the objection and then argueing global climite change (citing quotes from professors, science organizations, etc.). IOW, after claiming his simple chart ot be a "silver bullet", "After this video, who could ever disagree?", proof that we need to choose column "yes", he's now essentially saying that it is flawed and simple and we should trust the scientists to do the complex study and analysis for us.



You know, being the cynic I am, I can't help but to think that he presented his flawed, little logic chart knowing that it would get a ton of attention just so he could do these followup videos so he could quote the evidence and testimony by scientists for global climate change with the knowledge that plenty of people would be watching....hmmm...(EDIT: Except it's not working, over 100,000 views for the original video, only a few thousand for each of the follow ups.)

It's excessive. Massively, uncomprehendably excessive. We are not going to run out of oil anytime soon.

I consider this Detroit's only real shot at every coming back as a major city. Such a thing would also greatly improve the property value of my house.

Move to Detroit to get off the shore and avoid drowning? Fuck that, I choose death.

dola,

The 3rd video would have been much better if he said what it was he was blowing up or burning each time (just text on the screen would do. I knew some of them, but not others.)

It's not quite that simple. Yeah, they move, but at what cost? It's one thing for a few families to move to another location. But what about tens of millions relocating because entire coastline areas are disappearing under water? What about the massive corresponding rise in property values at the new locations and the complete loss of property value in the flooding areas? What about the businesses that have to relocate, especially the ones involving manufacturing/assembly and the cost of rebuilding their facilities elsewhere? What about the cost of expanding the infrastructure of the cities and towns where the coastliners relocate - roads, sewers, power lines, etc.?

In short, it's not some simple equation of "people move". Yeah, they move, but at a potentially huge burden to our economy.

qotm

The massive increase in oil use combined with limited oil supplies (no matter how limited they may be) means that it's still a matter of WHEN rather than IF. I don't think anyone really knows with any real accuracy when the supplies are going to start dwindling, but I just hope it's long after I'm gone and buried. Going to be a scary, scary time when it happens.

I was about to say "damn straight" and then saw you're from Jersey ;)

SI

Or dogs start living with cats

Oil is our primary source of hydrocarbons, but it's far from the only source. The reason it's the primary source is because it's the easiest and cheapest source, also because of effecientcy. However, as the oil in the planet runs out, we'd have to turn to new sources, such as natural gas, extracting hydrocarbons from tar flats, or go back to using coal. There are a lot of sources to get hydrocarbons for energy, the problem is cost, but once the oil starts to dwindle, we'd be forced to go to new sources for hydrocarbons.

Coal was once our primary source, but we moved off of that to oil because it was better, even though coal is still plentiful. I'd be very, very surpised if we didn't move off of oil to something even more efficient as technology moves forward, long before we run out of oil.

Besides, it's not like we're going to wake up one moring, drive to the gas station and find out "Sorry, the earth just ran out of oil at 3:41 AM this morning. No more oil." It will be something we'll see coming decades in advance.

How many Wawas are there in Kansas? None. I rest my case.

That's not "extreme."

That's mass hysteria!

I agree, we will move on to something different once it becomes imminent, though there are still *lots* of things that require fossil fuels at some basic level, things outside of just cars and other obvious fuel guzzlers.

But that's not even really what I'm talking about when I say "scary". So many countries have a *lot* of cash tied up in the oil trade, and whatever ends up "suceeding" oil will lead to another mad resource grab at somepoint, as the rich oil nations, along with the corporations that deal with them, aren't just going to step back and fade away when their oil wells dry up.

I didn't watch the 2 other videos yet, but his argument seems to have the depth of the "Just say no" campaign. I think his argument is so full of holes, I can't agree with any of it.

First of all he is making the assumption that throwing money* at the problem will make it go away. There seams to be an assumption that the world's climate is stable, it might not be. If we have started global warming, we might be too late to stop it even if we cut our carbon output to zero.

Secondly he is assuming there is a known amount of money "X" that we need to spend to stop it. We have no idea how much we would need to do. What if we spend X dollars and we need to spend X+1 to fix it, we just waisted X dollars. What if we spend 10X, we just threw the would into a depression needlessly. The truth is: there is not 2 columns, but unknown trillions of columns. It is not a simple yes/no question.

I could go on, but I better go watch the other 2 videos first.


Also if he hasn't found anyone who would poke holes in his argument, he needs to stop preaching to the choir.

*I know it is more then just money, but that is the easiest way to explain the economic impact of what we would need to do.

That certainly doesn't raise the CC debate out of the puerile. In fact it perfectly illustrates one of the mechanisms that have caused my signature.

Wawa? Never heard of it. Is this like some little cutesy coast-only food chain that is vastly overrated and coasters like to brag about to feel smug like White Castle or how Krispy Kreme used to be but at it's core is just overrated and derives value because it's "exclusive"? ;)

SI

For the life of me, I could never understand the Wawa thing. It's a freaking gas station convenience store. I haven't been inside a gas station store in like 10 years! And I don't care how good their food is, I ain't eating at a gas station. Having a Wawa near me would be like owning a Segway - a few people claim it fundamentally changes their life, and the rest of us go on living completely unaffected by it.

Haven't I seen the exact same argument used before for a belief in God?

It's not a gas station convenience store. They have recently started getting into the "gas station" business, but they are mostly a 7-11, Piggly-Wiggly, Heritages, etc. type place. Only a thousand times better. Imagine a 7-11 with a Starbucks (without the seating area and all self-serve) and a deli inside of it and that would be close to what a Wawa is like.

7-11 is a gas station convenience store.

Interesting. I've never seen a 7-11 at a gas station.

I have rarely, if ever, seen one not attached to a gas station.

Must be a regional thing. I'd say that the majority of gas station in (South) NJ don't even have a store attached to it, and the ones that do just have a extremely small one that they own (not a chain). The only real exception being the gas stations Wawa owns. Never seen a Wawa attached to a non-Wawa gas station, never seen a 7-11 attached, never seen a Heritages attached.

EDIT: So anyway, how about that global warming thing...

Huh. I'd say a "convenience store," in my experience, is like a Walgreens or RiteAid type store, as opposed to the type I would normally see attached to a gas station. One is more of a pharmacy-type store, and the other generally sells week-old hot dogs 3 for $1.

I'm just finishing my masters in environmental science. Naturally this is a hot topic. There is still a lot that's unclear about global climate, especially when you add global dimming to the mix, but there a few things everyone should accept at this point:
1. There is a concensus among scientists that A. the earth is getting warmer, and B. we are causing it. The latest IPPC report claims as much scientific certainty as you'll ever see on a topic. I mean we're talking about legions of climatoligists ruling out whether the Earth's wobble could be causing rising temperatures. They were thorough. If they're wrong, then all science needs to be rethought.
2. Global climate change is happening and it will continue and there's nothing we can do about it for now. All we can do is drastically reduce our greenhouse gas emissions and hope that by 2050 things haven't gotten that bad.
3. There are a lot of things we can to reduce our energy consumption at very low cost (i heard Gore talks about this, but I haven't seen The Truth). These are things we should do anyways, to conserve resources, save money, and reduce air pollution.

Criticism of what we should do about GCC is healthy, but anyone who claims that the jury is still out should take his/her place next to the guy telling you the earth is 6,000 years old.

Pascal's Wager. He addresses it directly in the other videos, basically arguing that they look the same because they use a decision grid but that Pascal is different due to the reliance on infinities.

True, but he's doing that intentionally. He wants to get the youtube audience thinking about this and he knows he can't do that and go to the level of depth that the subject requires.

He also argues that we (i.e. you and me, the non-experts out there) don't need to be going into that level of details because the experts have already done it and they've come to a strong conclusion.

All of that is true.

But he states his logic is irrefutable and that no one has been able to poke a hole in it.
That is not claims I would make if I was oversimplifying a subject to get my point across.
It really hurts his credibility.

Anyone hear the NPR Science Friday from 2 weeks ago about permafrost and Alaska? I was listening to that when I was up in Boise and that was some compelling radio.

SI

Well, he says he hasn't heard it refuted yet. That's not the same as declaring it irrefutable. And in fact, he seems quite open to counter-arguments. In the later videos he lists several, and even acknowledges that some are valid before clarifying his own position to defend against them.

So at the very least, he seems willing to pretend that there could be intelligent arguments against him. That's more than you can says for 95% of the folks who make their cases online.

These are all spurious arguments against his logic. Any of your scenarios could fit into one of the four columns.

Dozens of studies say anywhere from 0.3 to 3 percent of GDP.

I think the videos are compelling, but the other ones he links from his page (the Bartlett lecture) are more so. Be sure to watch it.