What the Anti-Climate-Deniers Deny

It has been just over 10 years since I learned supply and demand of energy at the global level. Some time later, I had the opportunity to spend several hours at a seminar held on the campus of
Caltech at a presentation by Koonin himself. I imagine that some things have changed since then, but I am convinced that they are marginal. So in light of some interest in the matter of Trump's dismissal of 'The Paris Agreement'. So from some Facebook provocation I have responded as follows:

Cobb: 

It's not campaign season, so 'Go Trump' is ridiculous. I'm a climate change skeptic in the way that I think 'March for Science' is foolishness. What will be will be and people will adjust to the new economic conditions. What I cannot stand is the posing and the presumption that (among other things) that ordinary people should 'go green'.

All of you are going to go as green as your overlords demand, and yet you will still suffer from the inevitable economic dislocations.

If any of the political divas had an ounce of economic wisdom, then they'd be worth hearing out. But there is no such thing as a Scientific Consensus ETF, that is guaranteed to make money. That's because all of these climatologists failed real world statistics, just as they failed to predict the election of Trump. Intellectual fools at best, charlatans by the dozen. Appeals to authority.

As well, I'm comfortable with the East Anglia scandal being as large and long-lived as 'Bush Lied'.

 

Responder:

So ocean acidification doesn't exist? Or isn't man made? Carbon particles are not at historically insane levels? What I don't get about the "climate change ain't all that" crowd is the blasé nature with which they can say "the consensus isn't strong enough to justify action". 99% of the deniers are tied to the fossil fuel industry. How is that lost on people? Who is putting out replicable stats that is independently funded? I have yet to see an answer to this question. No snark, no offense. Just legitimately haven't heard one independent institute/thinktank/researcher who isn't in some way tied to fossil fuel $$$. It blows my mind the degree to which they can leverage a few well positioned stool pigeons and stall so much more in the way of solid science. Serious question: Is NASA a liberal stool pigeon with a climate science denial axe to grind?

 

Cobb: 

You don't distinguish between the inevitability of climate change and the capability of those who analyze to lead. This is a categorical error. It's precisely like saying all 1.2 billion in the Catholic Church is are idiots, but completely incapable of getting .01 of that to join or contribute to their own cause. You keep saying Exxon is wrong, but you can't fuel 1% of Exxon's market. Plus, you can't predict one iota of what Exxon will do when the oil runs out.

I think that's the legacy of the environmental movement, who were all Malthusians in the first place. Swerd is right. Conference junkets make no economic change. The 'scientific consensus' has no market presence because they simply expect to have their vanguard established by political fiat. The Bolsheviks co-opted science too. They wanted the state to own all of the tractors where previously there were only oxen.

Responder:

The role us plebes have is to vote for people who would make climate change a centerpiece of their political agenda. Beyond that, those of us with the disposable income can shift their consumption patterns to something more responsible (which generally costs more money). For the rest of us, the only real role we have is to tamp down on the ill-informed idea that climate change science is ambiguous, thereby increasing the market for climate change-aware politicians to capture resources + media space + votes. Exxon will lead from behind until they figure out how to make money, and their stonewalling may cost them their place as significant providers of energy. And that is exactly as it should be - why is Panasonic and Tesla leading on batteries, and not Exxon? Because they chose to be blind to the future of energy demand. So, let them now be forced to pay licensing fees to companies who hold the patents, be they solar/storage/hydrogen etc. But all of this is a complete digression - why crap on the consensus science in favor of climate change? Anytime I quiz anyone on this, I get crickets. Again, can you point me to a source that isn't in the pockets of fossil fuel industry? If not, then why be a stool pigeon and carry the water of a dead/legacy industry? Just to be chic and contrarian? I sincerely want to know what motivates people to crap on the vast scientific consensus behind climate awareness. So far, I got nothing but trolling (or dogmatic repubs who also believe Trump had the largest inaugural crowd in history, etc etc etc). Hey, I like dem lulz as much as the next btard. But c'mon now. Let's call a spade a spade.

And so finally:

What you are doing is essentially calling for moderate (adj) Muslims to moderate (v) radical Muslims, because they're all Muslims.

 

It doesn't work. It's not a thing that is within the responsible power of middle class individuals even as a collective. I think there is a myth in the middle class understanding of democracy that the aggregation of will into corporate power, and I use that word purposefully, will create corporate responsibility. It's like saying "If every shareholder with voting shares would just... then we can overrule and control the operations of..."

 

The problem you should understand is that there is no recourse in democracy. Once a government has got X amount of power, then corresponding disinvestment in voting does not result in a corresponding diminution in government authority. It only took some small fraction of American voters to turn over the whole over the government apparatus to Trump, as it did with Obama. The ratchet does not slide back gracefully, and in that regard Trump is the best you can get, which is the radical at the top undermining the system he runs.

 

The problem is even worse for a global endeavor which attempts to get some global consensus of its middle class participants to aggregate their power under some entity superseding the power of nations. The more wishful thinking of 'changing the world' voters proxy onto supranational organizations the more dangerously and inevitably irresponsible those organizations become.

 

In short. Responsive democracy does not scale. Exxon and the collective oil industry is that supranational, and it will not be responsive no matter what democratic means are attempted.

 

Why you hear crickets is simple. You are asking people who don't understand how the planet actually uses energy. The planet cannot and will not survive on alternatives to oil. THAT is the denial of scientific research. And here are the findings. http://cobb.typepad.com/cobb/files/Koonin_UCSB_0307.pdf

 

The bottom line is that the second and third world want what the first world has. Emergent populations want cars, trucks, planes, trains, automobiles, air conditioners, dishwashers, radios, televisions, computers, networks, cell phones, nightlife. Low energy per capita = Rural. High energy per capita = Cities. If you want the planet to save energy, you have to force people to stay down on the farm. Force. Not market. Force. Not vote. Force.

 

That means force India. That means force China. That means force South Asia. That means force Brazil. All of those billions want more energy. Western environmentalist politics are entirely incapable of dealing with that reality. All they can do is whine about what their domestic political opponents do to ignore their agenda. Booo hoo, you're 'anti-science'. And what has this complaint availed them? Who among you would even bother to say as much to Putin?

 

So I conclude that all of the green political activism is trying to create a set of beasts through democratic means that would by some (never admitted) fiat, force compliance in governments to compel overburdensome taxation. They will fail. But they also will keep trying, and if on some measure they succeed, then the nature of those beasts will be no more responsive than the supranational beasts who now provide the supply for the growing energy demands of the planet.

 

The only thing big enough to change that is war.