I\’ve seen this poll mentioned at both places:
The Science Museum\’s Prove it! exhibition asks online readers to endorse or reject a statement that they\’ve seen the evidence and want governments to take action. As of yesterday afternoon, 1,006 people had endorsed it and 6,110 had rejected it.
Well done lads!
(Of course, as you all know I\’m on the it is happening, we\’re causing it side. But I do love it when the masses rise up and epater les bourgeois.)
I’m one of the nay sayers on ‘Prove It’. New to this blog are you really on the it’s happening, we’re causing it side? If so why?
Tim adds: I’m convinced by what the IPCC says basically.
But do note that the IPCC does not go on to propose any solutions, that’s a matter of economics and politics and there I differ from the consensus wildly. Probabaly because I actually understand the economics of what all the various different groups are proposing.
Oh I’m of the opposite opinion, I don’t understand the economics very well, but understand the climate science and am unconvinced by the IPCC,
Don’t think the models have done a brilliant job of predicting the last 11 years, so why should we trust them going forward? (So they’ve been improved you say? OK, but it’s not unreasonable to ask that we wait another 11 years to prove this, is it?)
But quite apart from the science: even it were absolutely clear-cut that whatever they say is going to happen, will happen: why do we need to destroy our economy and completely restructure our way of life to deal with it? If we have decades of time, let’s just deal with the effects as they arise; we’ll have better tech and more wealth in the future. Why do we need to decide everything now? Why the pressure for binding action on a world scale?
The cynical would point out that the effect of all of this is suspiciously in line with the goals of the anti-globalisation and anti-capitalist movement, and that the enviromentalist movement is anti-progress and conservative in the true sense of a longing for a mythical simpler past that never actually happened.
The more hysterical the predictions of doom become, the more I am reminded of the anti-tobacco and anti-drug lobbies. There is a grain of truth there, certainly, but nothing to justify the wholesale interference in freedom that is desired.
So: count me out, thanks. I’m putting my faith in the abilities of free humans to solve any problems should they arise. Seems to have worked pretty well so far. None of the great exercises in planning have achieved anything other than a corrosion of the human spirit, a tremendous waste of resources, and a huge amount of death, misery and suffering.
stephen – you need to add that socialists have probably caused more despoliation of the Earth than capitalists
I think you may be right Stephen! According to the Al Fin blog, there’s going to be a new ‘kid on the block’ in power generation in the next two or three years, in the shape of the ‘Hyperion Reactor’ – it would be lovely if it were true!