Finally a global warming dude I can agree with, how about you?

Question

Dr. Lomborg believes its dangers have been hyped, he agrees that global warming is real and will do more harm than good. He advocates a carbon tax and a treaty forcing nations to budget hefty increases for research into low-carbon energy technologies.

But the best strategy, he says, is to make the rest of the world as rich as New York, so that people elsewhere can afford to do things like shore up their coastlines and buy air conditioners. He calls Kyoto-style treaties to cut greenhouse-gas emissions a mistake because they cost too much and do too little too late. Even if the United States were to join in the Kyoto treaty, he notes, the cuts in emissions would merely postpone the projected rise in sea level by four years: from 2100 to 2104.

“We could spend all that money to cut emissions and end up with more land flooded next century because people would be poorer,” Dr. Lomborg said as we surveyed Manhattan’s expanded shoreline. “Wealth is a more important factor than sea-level

Answer 1

So, it has never occurred to the rest of the world to become "as rich as New York" before, but now that it's affecting global climate, then they'll all just set out to accomplish it?

So somewhere in the third world, you have folks saying, "I kind of like the squalor, the hunger, the pestilence more than the riches of New York, but if it will stop global warming, then I'm ready to change for the good of the planet. Sign me up."

So how is a carbon tax going to increase global wealth? And even if this were possible, how is increased wealth NOT going to result in increased consumption and reduction of valuable resources?

Answer 2

Dr. Bjorn Lomborg is a political scientist and not an economist nor a real environmentalist. He has been giving talks all over the world stating that money going into preventing the catastrophic consequences of global warming should go to solving the AIDS epidemic in Africa and other "problems" that he considers more urgent. He has been discredited by most all the important environmental groups. His premise that we have unlimited resources to make everyone rich is ridiculous. The earth is an ever shrinking reservoir with a growing population demanding more and more limited resources sucking the earth dry.

We cannot afford to make the Third World nations have the same standard of living as the developed world without straining all our resources and over burdening the planet.

The solution is for the developed world to lower their standard of living.

Secondly, the growing population of the Third world is a serious problem that needs to be addressed. We can't afford to support 6 billion people, let alone 9 billion people without causing serious damage to Mother Earth. There just isn't enough natural resources to go around. Earth does not have an unlimited supply that we can keeping digging and using to take care of so many people. Considering the serious nature of pending catastrophe due to global warming, drastic measures may eventually be the only solution.

We should have a UN body that can regulate our resources and use them only where needed. Most of the common people in western countries are living far beyond their needs. It is wrong that people who don't provide important benefit to society should have such luxuries when individuals in Third World countries do not. While those who benefit society the most should not be held back from providing important service in government and information via media.

Countries will need to give power to an organization such as the UN to control resources that the world must share together as well as to control the growth of populations that there is a fair and equal distribution of all human types. It has been established that the most the earth can have inhabit would be around 2 billion humans at any one time.

We have to be prepared to live the future today, only because if we don't, the survival of the planet and the human species is at stake.

Answer 3

According to the best peer reviewed scientific literature we must reduce worldwide outputs of carbon dioxide to less than one tenth fo what they are today if we are to have any chance of stopping Global Warming.

To accomplish that we would have to ban the use of all fossil fuels worldwide.

We are making almost no headway toward that goal in the United States and I do not see any possibility of success at banning the use of fossil fuels by countries such as China, India and Russia.

We must consider the possibility that we will not be able to stop Global Warming and instead prepare for the ways we will respond to Global Warming.

With respect to making the rest of the world as rich as New York, that is an admirable goal, However people have been trying to achieve that for years. That is definitely one goal that is easier said than done.

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Answer 4

I wouldn't really describe Lomborg as a 'global warming dude', he's more of a politician. His qualifications are a BA and PhD in political science, he is a professor of political science.

His publications about global warming led to an investigation being carried out by the Danish Government (he's Danish) on the grounds that he'd misled people into thinking he was qualified to comment on global warming. No official charges were brought against him as he had pointed out that he wasn't a scientist and was operating outside his sphere of knowledge (in other words, he admitted to not knowing what he was going on about).

Bjorn Lomborg is very intelligent but not the best source of info regarding global warming. Within the few points you make there are massive errors.

For example, if global warming is beneficial why does he advocate imposing taxes and seeking low-carbon technologies, surely we should be doing the opposite.

The cost of shoring up coastlines is astronomical, globally it would cost hundreds of trillions of dollars and all this does it to temporarily mitigate against an effect that people can avoid by moving to higher ground. It doesn't address any of the other issues such as the spread of disease, increased flooding, droughts etc. For far less money technologies can be developed that would reverse global warming altogether.

How can the world become as rich as New York, if they possessed this ability they would long ago have done so. It would require an economic growth rate of 600%, a healthy economy has a growth rate of perhaps 3 or 4%.

Answer 5

I have read his very informative book about global warming,"the Skeptical Environmentalist." He was a liberal environmentalist that sought to disprove some right wing claims and he discovered that some of them were essentially correct. Lomborg is practical and wants an evaluation of the consequences of trying to stop global warming while considering the benefits and the costs. Alarmists typically only see negative consequenses and refuse to acknowledge the benefits of warming of which there are many. They also typically refuse to look at the wasted resources it would take to achieve their goals. Because alarmist won't look at the whole picture, their proposed solutions are deficient. That is the point Lomberg was made so suggesting that Lomborg somehow was promoting increasing CO2 is off the mark. Lomborg points out that rich countries have the resources to cliean up after themselves and have done so in large part. MOst of the claims to the contrary are hysterics. He is left of me but Lomborg's book is very informative and worth reading.

Lomborg also pointed out the very small benefit of the projected global warming if we substantially reduced output of CO2. It would be in the margin of error so those such as the previous post that suggest we must reduce CO2 emissions by 10 per cent are factually wrong IMO.

Answer 6

No no. That will not do. Global warming must kill us all or it will be no fun for the chicken littles. You and your good Dr are going to cause global warming to go away like the hole in the ozone and acid rain. And dead whales. Then what will we whine about? Just let the silly people have global warming to cry about. It keeps then busy and makes them forget the real problems on earth.

Answer 7

The fact is that the administration, accepted the reality of global warming, couple of years ago. Pentagon hired, some independent scientists to study GW, and to determine all possible scenarios it could cause. The report is available for public review. Best Regards.

Answer 8

I think his conclusion is wrong. It's rarely smarter to treat the symptom rather than to treat the cause of the problem.

"But the best strategy, he says, is to make the rest of the world as rich as New York"

Well gee, that sure sounds simple! Sheesh.

Answer 9

It sounds like Dr. Lomborg is out to lunch.

Answer 10

Who is Dr. Lomborg?