It’s time again for weekend reflections, which makes space for longer than usual comments on any topic. Civilised discussion and no coarse language please.
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John Quiggin 
I am excited to be celebrating human achievement hour tomorrow at 8:30 pm. To celebrate I will turn on all of my appliances (within reason, I don’t want to trip the circuit breaker!). I am doing this to celebrate the wonders of human innovation and achievement (and capitalism) which allows me to have so many wonderful things devices at my fingertips.
…and at 8.31pm tomorrow, Rationalist will use his wonderful electric carving knife appliance cut off his own nose in order to spite his face.
@Neil
I don’t actually have an electric carving knife, you gave me a laugh though Neil.
Melbourne experiencing what I read was its worst hailstorm in recorded history, Perth having the worst hailstorm that I can remember, the UK having the heaviest snow fall in nearly 20 years and parts of the US having their worst snow storms since the 1920s. All within a few months. You would think this would give a “sceptic” food for thought.
@Rationalist
Mad as a march hare … celebrating the dimunition of the ecosystem services upon which humanity depends on the advice of people who are clearly delusional about the state of the world.
Rationalist – I’m thinking of putting up the Xmas lights.
@Fran Barlow
I’m always a bit confused by the position that observing things like Earth hour automatically translate as a zealous belief in the most extreme views associated with a particular position, and I’m wondering, seeing as you seem to be making those assumptions, whether you could explain your perspective a bit better.
For me, Earth Hour is an opportunity to show respect the the planet that happens to be our home and, if only for that hour, diminish the strain on the power grid that, as you say, provides so much of the security and quality of life that we enjoy. It’s about respect.
Actually, I just take that whole first paragraph back and go buy some reading glasses. I’ll read more carefully next time… *backs out slowly and with humility*
Milton residents fight high-rise menace
Developers, have in their sights, a tract of open space in the Bribane suburb of Milton, formerly occupied by the Milton Tenis courts on which they plan to erect high rise appartments that will house at least an additional 2,000 extra people. The total combined number or residents and workers that would be jammed into the suburb of Milton, from this and an existing proposal for residential and commercial development above Milton Station, could be 12,000, that is as many as live in the rural town of Warwick.
What you can do: (1) Attend meeting of CRAMED (http://cramed.org) to oppose these developments at the Milton State School at 6.30PM on Monday 29 March. (2) Attend the protest to save the Koala and to stop overdevelopment at the Queensland Government Growth Summit at 11.00AM Tuesday 30 March at the main entrance of Queensland State Library, Southbank.
Changing the topic, I saw this
http://economicedge.blogspot.com/2010/03/most-important-chart-of-century.html
at Some Assembly Required. The implication (if this is true), is that fiscal stimulus in the US is reducing economic activity.
My first thought is that the commentator is confusing correlation with causation. But I also thought – what happens if you exchange private debt, which can be repudiated without too much damage, for public debt.
Any thoughts?
Note however that no less an environmental luminary than Peter Newman is pro high rise housing!
http://melbourneurbanist.wordpress.com/2010/03/25/what-role-for-high-rise-towers-in-melbourne/
daggett #9. There are good environmental reasons for high rise such as reducing the impact of increased populations on the total built footprint.
However I do wonder if part of this environmental benefit is lost by people who use more energy to dry clothes, run lifts up and down and people need to consume more as they produce less especially as much of that consumption requires high transport costs. There are other associated costs such as the loss of community if the exterior spaces are cramped and of poor quality because this is an area that developers will often scimp. Planning has yet to really ensure high quality and the housing commission flats are probably setting the standard in too many cases.
Meantime the impacts of such a development in the local area will be noticeable in transport, parking and traffic problems, crime and pressures on local services. It is rare that these impacts are factored into decision making. If there is no way that the development will be refused on planning grounds then it is up to the broader community to make sure that the council and state government understand that the wider issues must be addressed up front.
Jill, are you sure about [high rise = more crime] or does it tend to look that way because the measure or perception is crimes per km2 rather than crimes per head? Sydney has a lot of low-crime high-density suburban precincts.
Off the top of my head, I’d prefer 2,000 inner city units to 2,000 mcmanshions of sprawling greenfield development – environmentally, economically and socially. I’d rather save hundreds of hectares of bush than tens of hectares of tennis courts, I’d rather the train travel than the car travel.
For every inner city nimby, there is an outer urban nimby who is on the edge of the sprawl and doesn’t want to be leapfrogged.
Earth Hour is a funny one. I know the message is more symbolic than anything, but I don’t think the picture of people sitting in the dark by choice helps the environmental movement much.
As a comparison Human Achievement Hour is a great example of idiotic reactionary thinking. It’s just showing off the fact that we can grab more resources than we need, and advances the mantra of greed and waste.
It makes me wonder what they mean by “Human Achievement”? I figure it’s similar to GDP, where the damage bill from a natural disaster increases activity, so from that perspective it’s actually a good thing! How about we set our sights alittle higher, and aim for achievements that are wholly positive, inclusive, sustainable and resilient, without externalities?
Come 8.30 all my lights will be off, and I’ll be enjoying a walk with my fiancé in a publicly lit park, listening to the sounds of a nearby concert I couldn’t afford to get into. I’ll also be recognising human achievement by using my solar powered torch.
I’ll be doing a 90% Earth hour. That is to say, I may have a light on but with everything else off and trying to manage my energy consumption wisely.
And yes, I very much believe AGW is real and I blog about it. However, I’m somewhat suspect of the genesis of Earth Hour (by advertisers who also devise campaigns for energy and tobacco companies). It many raise some awareness, but I think the message should be “Every hour is Earth Hour. Use energy wisely. Switch to solar, do something to reduce your carbon footprint every day.”
Mike <—— heretic? 😉
Jumping on the heretic remark, a year or so I had a long and productive argument with some climate change deniers. I can call them deniers because we had a long conversation about the correct terminology, and they chose ‘believer’ for me, but strongly opposed the term ‘agnostic’ for themselves, applying the idea of faith to me while avoiding it themselves. The idea I kept pushing on them – of an open mind – was deeply offensive, and that point (among others) shut down the debate.
I consider myself a heretic. I’m not sure one way or another, but regardless of the state of the climate want to see measurement and abatement of pollution.
I don’t want to retread ground, but I would be interested about how some of the skeptics here feel about the term ‘agnostic’ to define their position on climate change? Apart from the religious connotations it is essentially the same thing – unconvinced by but open to further evidence.
If they are similar, why hasn’t the term had more traction?
This is very interesting. Of course, like Steve Keen, these commentators falsely rant and raille about debt without delving deeper.
The increase in debt, is a symptom. It is logical that its marginal efficiency diminishes because the provision of debt only paper-overs a underlying problem (a structural contradiction within capitalism). If you leave this contradiction then cycle after cycle you have to produce another lot of debt plus pay-off previous debt. This is an additional, compounding impost that, eventually, terminates the sequence.
However a detailed exploration of this dynamic usually exceeds the attention span of most bloggists and the political dreams of most mainstream economists.
In the long run its tough luck for all of us.
http://economicedge.blogspot.com/2010/03/most-important-chart-of-century.html
Interesting idea. Debt produces GDP. How much GDP will an extra dollar of debt produce? Simply divide existing GDP by existing debt and you have the answer. But if that is true then the new GDP divided by the new debt will have exactly the same ratio as the old divided by the old. Oh, I didn’t think about that? So, that idea doesn’t seem to work.
Doh! Some blogs do ‘ave ’em.
Just thinking on it, the SA election, which indicates the pressures of neolib globalisation on locales, well exemplifies the trend Chris Warren is discussing. Within our closed system, information is mediated on an imperative for profits and power that denies the public an informed input.
Hence the silulacra wins. In SA the upholders; liblab right wings, , corporations, thinktanks, consultants and the Advertiser and tabloid media, as the people are given false choices thru a cessation of real information. The place will be carved up, as Clive carved up Bengal for the Brits, but within theparametres of the current myth, we get to know its our sinfulness and greed that have created whatever problem seems to upset the big formations, because they told us so, themselves.
Talk about medieval superstitious village life!
@Foib
How about calling the deniers, euphemistically, evidence-resistant or evidence-immune or rationality-immune etc., simply to suggest that they have had a full spectrum inoculation to make them completely immune to evidence and rational argument.
Picky lot. They probably would object to these too.
@Michael Lockhart
I see Michael. Ok for the record, I see Earth Hour as a legal and communitarian way of declaring in favour of human practices that would tend to preserve the quality and quantity of ecosystem services. Last year, in our community, there was a celebratory and community picnic kind of feel, as we set up in our local park with our neigbourhood watch ward, and told stories of the days before electric lighting and on-demand gas, surrounded by anti-mosquito incence candles and some old oil lamps.
It was especially heartening that I managed to organise some of the older people I look in on to come along and they got to tell of a life in our district that few of us can remember. I brought along some newspaper clippings from the 1930s and asked them to explain the context and the kids thought the resultant stories fascinating. I brought along a sheet, a data projector and speakers and my laptop and with the aid of a car battery and a suitable transformer by one of our electrician neighbors did an impromptu review of how we came to be in the conditions that we are.
I’m not sure how much we saved in CO2, but ultimately that really doesn’t matter. Rather, we left the park with a strengthened sense of the bonds we humans share, our interconnectedness with the ecosystem and the challenges and costs of tinkering with it. That night, the cargo cult mentality suffered a serious setback and we left with a strengthened sense of mission on doing something to preserve the things that make life worth living.
As for Earth Hour, I notice the local reactionary version has been imported – by their own admission – from the US Competitive Enterprise Institute by SA Senator Cory Bernardi’s ‘Conservative Leadership Foundation’.
This includes a downloadable poster that urges the reader ‘Don’t be stuck in the dark with the communists’. (http://www.conservative.org.au/Campaigns/HAH/Communist Poster.jpg – note the remarkable inability to perceive the location of China in this image!)
You can even participate in a hilarious competition to have your photo taken holding a poster in front of some carbon-intensive activity; thgere’s an example of some generic poindexter doing a thumb’s up in front of some equally generic industrial plant.
I reckon the Liberal Party would be well advised to publicly distance themselves from of precisely this kind of wing-nuttery.
I also notice that Kevin Andrews is one of the available Speakers on the group’s list.
@Foib
Because neither the term skeptic nor the term agnostic are apt descriptions of the deniers, though as Maurice Newman tried recently, they occasionally resort to them as disingenuous cover. They aren’t skeptical of the nonsense retailed on their side that they claim doesn’t represent their position. They also clearly don’t understand what it is they are doubting. Nor is the etiology of climate change a matter of beleif in the sense that matters of faith are. It’s a matter of measurement and methodologically robust process. One can fail to understand or be ignorant but this isn’t being agnostic. All that is needed to draw inferences is present.
@daggett
Properly designed, higher density (not necessarily high density) lving can make good environmental sense and lead to improved service per dollar of expenditure. Urban sprawl is not a good thing.
sorry – Poster link should be http://www.conservative.org.au/Campaigns/HAH/Communist Poster.jpg
@Fran Barlow
Good answer, but there is a small percentage who have honestly looked at the data and have some to a different conclusion, or a yet to be convinced, and in that case the term skeptic or agnostic does fit. I know some people in this category, and I would not call them deniers. Intellectually lazy and biased, maybe. A big difference is that they don’t expend any energy trying to find out more or change anyone else’s opinion. They do however have an open mind, and are on the path to understanding the issue, even if it’s very slow movement. I would call this failure to understand being agnostic, as it’s not a strongly held position. The vast majority, especially on-line, do not fit in this category, but I’m interested in how they see themselves, especially in terms of having an open mind.
@bill
Maybe Kevin Andrews should go and check how many lights they have in capitalist Papua New Guinea, or any number of wannabe capo states in Africa.
Funny thing is that if you asked capitalists to honor their debt, most of their public utilities would have to shut down.
What do people want, lights at midnight or free health care?
@Foib
In this context, that excludes “honestly” looking at the data. In this context, honesty implies intellectual rigour, which cannot co-exist with intellectual indolence or cherrypicking. Skeptics — actual skeptics rather than mere imposters — make it their business to meet the demands of intellectual rigour because they take themselves and their ideas seriously. They are every bit as offended (and perhaps more so) when someone agrees with them on a spurious or specious basis.
That just debauches the language. It’s lazy, sloppy and offensive to those who on the matter of metaphysics are agnostic. One either knows enough to form an opinion, or one does not. The latter is simply the state of being under-informed or insufficiently engaged to have an opinion. It is not agnostic. One agrees that a soundly-based opinion is possible.
I strongly doubt that my house will burn down, but I still insure against the possibility. That’s because I’m a house fire sceptic, not a house fire denier.
It’s very clear and simple. An AGW denier resists measures to reduce greenhouse emissions. A sceptic supports them, just in case.
@Fran Barlow
So unconvinced people who are lazy are not skeptics. Agreed.
Next we are getting into the question of whether something is unknown or unknowable. I’ve been treating it as something which is generally known, but unknown/disagreed with by the subject in question. Unknowable didn’t even come into it for me. My bad.
So what would you use for people who are not active deniers, and at least have a open mind? Lazy? Uninformed?
I’d prefer something nicer, but can’t think what, given my other suggestions have been shot down in flames.
@Foib
The term lazy is a catchall. I have zero interest in Formula 1 racing. If someone asked me whether Alan Jones was likely to beat Ayrton Senna I would neither know nor care. I don’t even know if they are still competing. One could call that laziness on my part, but of course, I don’t think it’s all that important for me to know. I know that I could find out, but I have no interest. I wouldn’t even know if someone who calimed to be an expert was an expert whose opinion was reliable, but if he claimed it, I’d probably take his word for it. I’d say I was uncommitted if asked.
That wouldn’t make me an agnostic on the question.
If it were important to public policy to know, then perhaps the term “lazy” would be more apt, at least if one is to be a good citizen.
Perhaps the term “uncommitted” might be the best and least pejorative description of those who feel they aren’t for some reason in a position to make a judgement on the matters at hand. I take it as self evident that uncommitteds ought to defer to those most likely to be expert on relevant matters of public policy. In that case though, they ought at least to know who those people are. In this case, it would be the relevant Academies of Science in each country and their coordinating agency — the IPCC.
@Fran Barlow
Most of the delusionists are simply people with a believe in the supremacy of the market to solve all problems. They don’t have a nuanced, evidence-based approach that considers the applicability of markets to particular situations or things like the merits of different market management mechanisms – it’s all or nothing. After investing themselves in this Hobson’s choice they simply can’t cope with a clear externality like AGW. It’s either go into denial or ditch their entire philosophy.
The fact is that denial is psychologically easier for the vast majority of these people. Unfortunately, this entails believing that the all the thousands of real climate scientists around the world are either totally mad, completely incompetent, and/or involved in a conspiracy to withhold the truth that makes faking the moon landings a cinch, but so be it. That’s why we have to have this psychotic “debate” on AGW.
(I’ve wondered why these guys don’t presume they have similar prowess in other highly complex technical tasks. You don’t find them claiming to be able to (say) redesign the Airbus A380 so it flies properly, but I expect that if the Airbus A380 threatened their market supremacy theory it would be decried as a dangerous piece of flying junk.)
The obvious question to denialists is “Just supposing it were true, what should be done?” I expect this would produce further writhing and denial.
Just wondering if this is of any interest to anyone. Part of my thesis.
Discuss the usefulness and limitations of the Internet in facilitating a democratic civic society which allows the interplay of different interests and positions in the public domain:
Internet especially the blogesphere challenges the old ,hierarchical, top down filtration structure 1 of gate keeping, ie the admission of so called newsworthy information into mainstream media. The old editorial policy/public access to information process ,is seriously challenged by alternative media .
As shoddy as the journalism is, Adam Nagourney’s article2 contains some interesting propositions. He claims that the advantage, in the Obama campaign seemed to lie, with the Democrats, who’s constituents are in the more inpovorished social stratas. Although this argument is not paticually well supported, it make for an interesting conjecture. The sailent question as always, is logistical. This execerp;
“Republican presidential campaign, hopefully a re-election for John McCain, will need to be a billion-dollar affair to challenge what the Democrats have accomplished with the use of the Internet and viral marketing to communicate and raise money. 3”
While fanciful, and vaccuous of contingent alternative hypothesis, this article gives rise to another possible political promotional tool. It does of course assume that only democrat voters can, or will ever be positivily affected by internet based campains, and that the Rebublicans will not respond with an equalising counter strategy. The tenor of the article simultaneously lays claim for both the Obama victory and all future victories in the name of ‘technology to, and for, the illiterate.” That said the genie apperas to be out of the bottle.
Bartlett’s Blog ; reference to SA law tightening http://andrewbartlett.com/?p=7445
OOPs! this is the correct reference ;]
Adam Nagourney New York Times http://www.nytimes.com/2008/11/04/us/politics/04memo.html
@Jim Birch
You were quite right at the beginning of your post and should have stuck with that. If you read Lomborg, you find out what happens when that proposition clashes with the interests of the elite. You insist adaptation is cheaper and more effective and claim that fighting malaria would make more difference to human welfare (presumably because the money would go to big pharmaceutical and chemical companies) on the basis that one excludes the other and despite the fact that you have hitherto shown no interest at all in abating malaria and still don’t now.
In short, you aim for distraction. As someone who trains dogs, I can attest that this is a fabulous tactic for moderating undesirable behaviours — far better than confronting the dog directly — and I see no reason why it wouldn’t work in humans. Lomborg is a games theorist by training. Still, it does underline how the filth merchant apologists see the populace.
@Keith Harding
Nice try …
You should try hiding the fact that you would like us to do your work for you a little better than you have above.
You’re supposed to pretend you are “just asking questions” and then offer some leading questions, supposedly prompted by some real events in the world. That can work pretty well until people cotton onto the game.
Epic fail …
I might have to try this. Must be better for the old sanity.
An interesting piece in the Melbourne Age which presents discussion at the Bushfire Royal Commission on the changed [lowered?] maintenance standards of the privatised power industry. http://www.theage.com.au/national/power-line-fire-time-bomb-20100326-r36z.html
Prof Q has discussed privatisation issues in the past I recall but I don’t recall this specific issue.
It seems to me that the issues are very real when companies are driven by cost cutting imperatives and regulation is weak.
I’m not sure who came up with the cockammamy (spelling?) idea of “human achievement hour” as a means of thwarting the goals of Earth Hour, but I’m hardly surprised to see that Dennis Jensen of the Libs is supporting the “lights on” campaign.
By all means celebrate human achievement, but just remember that it is in no way a case of “human achievement” on one side of the scales and “environmental issues” on the other. During Earth Hour, why not have a look up at the night sky – if not cloudy – and remind yourself that there is a lot more to this world than human achievement. The false dichotomy of human achievement vs environment is the one that makes a regular appearance in some arguments against the very idea of human-induced global warming.
Knock yourself out, Rationalist 🙂
FOIB
The term agnostic might be suitable for some, but not me.
I reject AGW for the simple reason that unlike Phil Jones and others in the climate science area, I include the electrical energy the Earth system receives via the solar electrical circuit that NASA is only now starting to become aware of.
Plasma Universe theory and its related discliplines are published under the auspices of the IEEE, the largest scientific society on earth. Plasma Universe theory is an official science topic for the IEEE.
There are millions of amperes of energy entering in and out of the earth via the polar
Birkeland currents (which when the current density increases causes the auroras to be visible), as well as energy coming via the Van Allen Belts. The motive force for the Earth’s rotation are the polar Birkeland currents, and as those travel through the earth, allowing the earth to build up electrical charge (it behaves as a leaky capacitor) which then discharges periodically either as earthquakes, volcanic activity, or as lightning. These auroral electric currents are routinely measured by satellites.
None of this energy is factored into any climate model, and the principal reason why climate science, when they do their inputs and outputs based solely on solar radiation and earth radiation, note the lack the energy sources to explain the observed thermal behaviour of the Earth.
The AGW hypothesis is simply wrong because the science is incomplete. The sun is a variable star and while its visible output might not vary much, it’s output in the rest of the electromagnetic spectrum is enormous. The sun itself is powered by galactic sized electric currents, as is the whole solar system.
Where’s the Mortein?
I forgot that ignoring the electrical input, climate science looks for next obvious cause – humanity. When all else fails, blame humanity.
How about scientific ignorance?
Salient Green, droll, very droll.
I have to say that simply consuming power unnecessarily is the most puerile, shallow and idiotic way to celebrate human achievment. The idea is a good one if done to celebrate good achievments and while burning coal to generate this waste of power may once have been a good achievment, it is no more.
I believe up until now human achievment has been easy compared with what is to come. We have followed our natural inclination to explore, conquer, subdue, destroy, expand and exploit to arrive at our present civilization. It’s all been alot of fun this self indulgent cleverness. Unfortunately this cleverness has not been tempered by a lot of wisdom and the biosphere on which we clever apes depend is groaning under our onslaught.
The next phase will have to be a fight for survival where we learn to live with less material goods and co-operate rather than compete with not only our own species but every other species on earth in a desperate and painful lesson in sustainability.
I am currently wasting the maximum power I can for human achievement hour.
@Salient Green
LOL Salient…..there must be an effective pesticide out there somewhere. I know Gerard wanted to call in the psychiatrists for the mental illness in the right but I think you are on to something that might just work better.
Louis, the scientists blamed everything BUT humanity and it didn’t add up. We didn’t want Global Warming to be our fault. We didn’t mean it, honest. We were just having a lot of fun subduing nature to our whims and desires. It’s been so easy shitting over the edge of the nest but it’s built up high and now it’s starting to slide back in on us. Of course some people can’t believe it’s our own shit. I bet your farts don’t stink Louis.
Made me laugh Salient Green.
Is Mortein up to the task though?Will Mortein add to global warming? How much energy does it take to make a can of Mortein. Could we give up Mortein for an hour?
Sorry JQ about the crudity but I have seen one too many of this guy’s post’s . Maybe I should just have observed earth hour and shut the lid on him Alice.
Jill, I use a Fly Gun. It can be a bit messy but in the interests of marital harmony I have learned to perform the executions discretely and to clean up immediately.