From The New York Times of September 21:
LONDON, Sept. 20 — A British scientific group, the Royal Society, contends that Exxon Mobil is spreading “inaccurate and misleading” information about climate change and is financing groups that misinform the public on the issue.
The Royal Society, a 1,400-member organization that dates back to the 1600′s and has counted Isaac Newton and Albert Einstein as members, asked Exxon Mobil in a letter this month to stop financing these groups and to change its public reports to reflect more accurately the opinions of scientists on the issue.
There is a “false sense somehow that there is a two-sided debate going on in the scientific community” about the origins of climate change, said Bob Ward, the senior manager for policy communication at the Royal Society.
The reality is that “thousands and thousands” of scientists around the world agree that climate change is linked to greenhouse gases, he said, with “one or two professional contrarians” who disagree.
The Royal Society is totally dishonest in its claims and is out to intimidate and silence those with whom it disagrees. There are not one or two “contrarians” who dispute the claims of the Greens concerning global warming but over 17,000 scientists. These scientists in fact have actually signed a petition stating their opposition in no uncertain terms. As the organizers of the petition point out, the signers “so far include 2,660 physicists, geophysicists, climatologists, meteorologists, oceanographers, and environmental scientists who are especially well qualified to evaluate the effects of carbon dioxide on the Earth’s atmosphere and climate.” As they further point out, the signers “also include 5,017 scientists whose fields of specialization in chemistry, biochemistry, biology, and other life sciences make them especially well qualified to evaluate the effects of carbon dioxide upon the Earth’s plant and animal life.” (The complete list of signatories is on line, organized both alphabetically and by state of residence of the signers, at http://www.oism.org/pproject/pproject.htm#357. The list of the 2,660 signers who are physicists, geophysicists, et al. is on line at http://www.oism.org/pproject/a_sci.htm. The list of the 5,017 signers who are scientists specialized in chemistry, biochemistry, et al. is on line at http://www.oism.org/pproject/b_sci.htm.)
The petition was organized by Frederick Seitz, who is the Past President of the National Academy of Sciences and President Emeritus of Rockefeller University. The petition itself is online, at http://www.oism.org/pproject/s33p37.htm.
It reads:
We urge the United States government to reject the global warming agreement that was written in Kyoto, Japan in December, 1997, and any other similar proposals. The proposed limits on greenhouse gases would harm the environment, hinder the advance of science and technology, and damage the health and welfare of mankind.
There is no convincing scientific evidence that human release of carbon dioxide, methane, or other greenhouse gasses is causing or will, in the foreseeable future, cause catastrophic heating of the Earth’s atmosphere and disruption of the Earth’s climate. Moreover, there is substantial scientific evidence that increases in atmospheric carbon dioxide produce many beneficial effects upon the natural plant and animal environments of the Earth.
The petition is accompanied by an eight page review of scientific information on the subject of “global warming” titled “Environmental Effects of Increased Atmospheric Carbon Dioxide.” I will make no attempt to summarize that review here. I will content myself merely with endorsing one of its essential conclusions, namely, that “Predictions of global warming,” which the Royal Society alleges to be indisputable, scientifically proven fact, “are based on computer climate modeling, a branch of science still in its infancy.”
There is absolutely no empirical basis for the Royal Society’s assertion. It is certainly not the case that a laboratory experiment has ever been performed, or could ever be performed, based on a side-by-side comparison of two identical planet Earths. In one of these planet Earths, an Industrial Revolution takes place and is followed by a catastrophic rise in temperature, while in the other, in which there is no Industrial Revolution, there is no catastrophic rise in temperature. That would be an experimentally established fact. There simply is no such experimentally established fact.
Moreover, repeated long periods of global warming have taken place on the one and only planet Earth that does exist, without any contribution whatever by Man, his industry, or by increases in atmospheric carbon dioxide caused by nature itself. In other words, the Royal Society has no actual empirical basis for its claims. All it has is computer climate modeling, which is no more reliable and accurate than weather forecasting, which is actually all that it is, only on a scale of centuries rather than days. This is the basis on which the Royal Society wants to squelch opposition to the Greens and their agenda of global government control and massive economic deprivation.
What we have in the Royal Society’s behavior is an obvious attempt at intimidation and the imposition of a conformity of thought on a major public issue. Imagine the uproar if the kind of letter sent by the Royal Society to Exxon had instead been sent by Exxon to the 1,400 members of the Royal Society urging them to stop their support of that organization because of its views on global warming. I can hear the denunciations now: “Inquisition,” “violations of free speech,” “strong-arm tactics,” “Fascism,” . . . .
Well, all of that is precisely what all of the world’s alleged defenders of freedom of speech and press should be saying right now about the tactics of the Royal Society. Those tactics are a perfect illustration of what noted MIT climate expert Prof. Richard Lindzen described last April in his Wall Street Journal article “Climate of Fear.” Joined with the arbitrary power of a host of government agencies that between them control virtually every aspect of its existence, they are capable of forcing Exxon to submit. In fact, I for one will not be surprised if Exxon ends up being compelled to be to the oil industry what Philip Morris has become to the tobacco industry, namely, a company that seems to exist for no other purpose than to discourage as much as possible the purchase of its products. Such self-abasing behavior is what can result when a company is at the mercy of arbitrary government power inflamed against it by vicious propaganda coming from those, such as the Royal Society, who pose as the fount of intellect and morality.
As it happens, the petition I have referred to has no financial support from Exxon or any other company in the oil, coal, or natural gas industries. Can the same thing be said about governmental support of The Royal Society and the endless “studies” dedicated to advancing the Green agenda?
The Royal Society should apologize to Exxon and to the respected scientists—Seitz, Lindzen, and the more than 17,000 others who oppose its views—whose reputations it has besmirched.
This article is copyright © 2006, by George Reisman. Permission is hereby granted to reproduce and distribute it electronically and in print, other than as part of a book and provided that mention of the author’s web site www.capitalism.net is included. (Email notification is requested.) All other rights reserved. George Reisman is the author of Capitalism: A Treatise on Economics (Ottawa, Illinois: Jameson Books, 1996) and is Pepperdine University Professor Emeritus of Economics.
{ 46 comments }
Prof. Reisman,
Thank you for a excellent and reasoned post on a highly emotional topic. Perhaps you would be interesed in this link http://www.weatherstreet.com/hurricane/2006/hurricane-atlantic-2006-below-normal-season.htm. It adress how, to date, hurricane activity for the 2006 season has been below normal, and by all appearences, will continue to stay below normal for the remainder of the season, despite the predictions of government scientists and the media last year.
Professor Reisman approaches the subject of global warming as a logical problem. He presents a cogent explanation of the speciousness of the ‘science’ being used to predict an imminent Doomsday. Unfortunately, global warming has moved far beyond logic and science. It is now an emotional/political issue and the ‘Nays’ have already lost. Whether carbon dioxide is good, bad, or neutral is has become immaterial. Most major corporations are now falling all over themselves to ‘reduce their carbon footprints’ and Joe Sixpack is convinced that, while Al Gore may indeed be an insufferable turkey, global warming is a real threat. But, as the saying goes, “It’s an ill wind….” All this rent-seeking hysteriea about global warming should eventually reduce the vast number of dollars we sent to assorted jihadists, crackpots, and sociopaths in exchange for oil.
Professor Reisman approaches the subject of global warming as a logical problem. He presents a cogent explanation of the speciousness of the ‘science’ being used to predict an imminent Doomsday. Unfortunately, global warming has moved far beyond logic and science. It is now an emotional/political issue and the ‘Nays’ have already lost. Whether carbon dioxide is good, bad, or neutral is has become immaterial. Most major corporations are now falling all over themselves to ‘reduce their carbon footprints’ and Joe Sixpack is convinced that, while Al Gore may indeed be an insufferable turkey, global warming is a real threat. But, as the saying goes, “It’s an ill wind….” All this rent-seeking hysteriea about global warming should eventually reduce the vast number of dollars we sent to assorted jihadists, crackpots, and sociopaths in exchange for oil.
Excellent article. I actually found out about this attempt by the Royal Society on a TV news program, in a special segment by George Monbiot.
There is so much scaremongering about this topic. There is free paper distributed in the UK called the Metro. Only a few days ago the frontpage, lead article bore the headline “Global Warming IS caused by humans.” A brief scan of the article, though, quickly revealed that the strong “IS” was actually “highly probable,” in other words, actually a “maybe.” Another brief scan revealed that “global warming” was actually a one degree rise over onehundred years in England, which the reprters must have somehow mistaken for the entire world!
Dear Dr. Reisman:
Welcome back to my favorite topic! Needless to say, I`ve missed you and the special spin you use to help us explain why it is perfectly reasonable and appropriate that large corporate rent-seekers should continue to have free and unhindered rights to use that unowned and unregulated global commons, the atmosphere, irrespective of the costs that we and future generations will all have to bear.
Before addressing the meat of the issues, allow me to suggest an alternate heading for your post:
“Dr. Reisman Rushes to Defend Exxon and Other Rent-Seekers against Requests for Information by the Royal Society Relating To Their Hidden Use of Paid Pundits to Delay Climate Change Action by Muddying the Scientific Issues; Exxon Relieved”
As an unhinged, extremist, collectivist, people-hating “environmentalist”, it probably will not surprise you to know that I have already commented on the issue of the Royal Society`s letter to Exxon, at the science policy blog managed by Roger Pielke Jr of the Center for Science and Technology Policy Research in Boulder: http://sciencepolicy.colorado.edu/prometheus/archives/the_honest_broker/index.html#000932. Those of you looking for links to the RS letter to Exxon and for a longer discussion might want to look there (my comments start about half-way in).
The short of it is that the RS was simply seeking information from Exxon on whether Exxon was complying with an undertaking – that Exxon had volunteered to the RS – not to seek to influence the political debate indirectly by using paid pundits such as CEI as proxies in making claims about the inadequacies of climate change science. While proposing and making decisions on policy is not the responsibility of scientific bodies, it seems well within the bounds of their responsibility to indicate when they think interested parties are acting in ways that frustrate open debate and policy balancing.
Moreover, the Royal Academy has no authority over Exxon and I am sure that while Exxon may be discomfited by the RS inquiries, they are hardly intimidated by them.
That Exxon (along with other fossil fuel producers and user industry groups) is a major rent-seeker in this matter is clear and its past extensive use of sophisticated indirect PR campaigns using unacknowledged pundits has been well-documented and is now a matter of public record in the use, as are the extensive campaign contributions these groups have made to Republicans in Congress and the close cooperation that the Bush administration political machinery (the Lutz memo) has given to this effort. Since its efforts to politicize and muddy the science while avoiding an honest political discussion have obviously been effective in frustrating policy mechanisms in the US and in protecting the ongoing subsidy that free abuse of the global commons represents, it is hardly surprising that Exxon continues to try to fund supposedly independent proxies to act on its behalf.
As for the Oregon Petition (now nine years old), I have already noted its failings rather extensively in this earlier post on your blog: http://blog.mises.org/archives/005248.asp (June 29). The petition came from a crackpot scientist in rural Oregon who somehow (without aid of industry you allege) was able to arrange for a WSJ editorial page review of a non-peer-reviewed paper and for the fronting by Dr. Seitz – the Dr. Seitz of fame for directing the flow of “research” funds from tobacco firms that “demonstrated” that smoking was NOT responsible for smoking-related health problems. Dr. Seitz participated in a project that was deceptively crafted to make it appear it was from the National Academy of Sciences, thus earning their subsequent public repudiation and rebuke. More information is here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oregon_Petition
As for the climate change science, your assertions that there is no meaningful or reliable science to support the position of the Royal Academy is absolutely jaw-dropping and evinces a shocking lack of willingness on your part to engage in serious inquiry or logical consideration. You might not have noticed, but over the past half year I have quite carefully laid out the basics of the scientific evidence and provided extensive links to it. Shall we take it that on serious matters you’d rather not invest your time, and to rely on your own presuppositions to wholly dismiss the national academies of the US, our allies and China, the views of climate scientists as summarized through the IPCC process, US presidents from GHWB on down, the leaders of hundreds of countries that find the evidence convincing, the leading US companies working through the Pew coalition and testifying before the Senate Energy Committee, and even Exxon itself, which has stated that “the accumulation of greenhouse gases in the Earth’s atmosphere poses risks that may prove significant for society and ecosystems, … [and] that these risks justify actions now, [e]ven with many scientific uncertainties”?
Are you are aware that even Prof. Stephen Hawking has recently made a public statement that global heating is an urgent problem? One wishes that you could be more forthright and simply state that it doesn’t matter what the evidence is or who believes it and is ready to act based upon it, because YOU are not convinced and don’t want to be. It seems that your mind, and thus your eyes and ears, are closed. Instead you insist that the scientific endeavor, and wise decision-making, is such that we have to push Humpty Dumpty off the wall before we can establish any policy about what the result might look like.
One would have thought that, as a Misean, both (i) the institutional failures that underlie global warming, namely, that nature of the atmosphere as a global commons that suffers from inadequate property rights, and (ii) the rents that flow to fossil fuel producers and users, and their ongoing efforts to maintain the flow of such rents, would be readily discernable to you, and that you would be sympathetic even if you prefer to avoid governmental action. But no – you prefer to deny, and to decry the science academies the rest of the world as mendacious. But you have a consistent record of deflecting any consideration of both the gross policy wrongs of this Administration and the ongoing record of rent-seeking by Exxon and others.
Hmm, let me see – rent-seekers and politician robbing us blind – GOOD; confused enviros and others upset about holding the bag – EVIL. Well you can continue to count me among the evil ones.
That puzzled environmentalist who hides behind the name of TokyoTom
Science does support a “discernable” human climate influence convoluted with natural climate change. That debate is over, but the debate about how the climate will continue to change and the consequences it produces is not settled, not a bit.
It does seem as if “green” pundits and activitists and politicians jump on the doomsday bandwagon and often cite the high-end of models and predictions which are not considered the likely outcomes. I find it outrageous and immoral for Al Gore to display 20 foot vertical inundation simulations for Manhattan and Florida when the best models and most likely outcomes are 1 ft. I think that is very misleading and is done with intent, the intent to enact an agenda beyond energy and climate.
Climate change is real though there are extreme misconceptions about it. Any “hot day” is considered proof of global warming by the media and the general public when maximum temperatures have NOT INCREASED! They might in the future. We don’t know. There is a lot we don’t know. The current body of evidence suggests a non-catastrophic climate change over the next century, but there will be significant costs and adaptations. The “green” side of the debate (I don’t want to use that word because you can be an environmentalist and be against CO2 restrictions) often assumes that catastrophy will happen when it is unlikely. The opposition seems content with the status quo. When Bush said Kyoto (and the senate too remind you, 95-0 I think) would be too damaging to our economy, he was right. He was wrong to say climate efforts were “junk science.”
What is needed for the debate is a good presentation of what the projected costs are for inaction, along with the projected costs possible actions. Costs for inaction are not doomsday scenarios! Costs are the cost of increasing sea-walls for 1-2 foot (not 20) sea level rise and development costs for 3rd world countries among others. Costs for action include loss of GDP and increased energy, heating, and transportation costs, and how they adversely affect the poor. I remember Kyoto would be projected to approximately leave the median American with an income of $75,000 in 2100 vs $110,000 with no action. Is it better to leave future generations with this income discrepancy? Is it better for our grandchildren to be richer a century from now so they can face costs of climate change, or is it better for us to face the climate change costs now and leave them poorer? These are real issues that people aren’t discussing. Economic modeling is an essential component of climate modeling, and the IPCC extensively uses economic models.
The “Green” side goes too far with their doomsday predictions, which aren’t the likely outcome, because they want to scare people into action. This is reasonable because there will be costs of inaction. People who want no action are justified too, as the costs of action when catastrophy is unlikely are significant.
CEI’s “commercials” did bring up an important point, that as CO2 emmissions have increased our quality of life has increased. This is very important and the “green” side often neglects this. The debate should center around (1) what are the likely outcomes of climate change and what are the associated costs and (2) how can we keep a growing economy now and (a) is it better to confront climate change now or (b)is it better to wait, be a richer world, and allow renewable energy sources to continue dropping in costs, so that future generations have more money to adapt to the significant climate change costs.
Tokoy Tom,
I am a physicist. As such, I am practised in dealing with another form of rent seeking: government funding of science. To deny that this form of subsidation is not going to influence scientific opinion about a highly political subject as global warming- where scientists in general, along with alternative energy companies, have much to gain in the form of ever more government funding, not to mention government itself, in the form of even more power-is to put blinders on and only listen to the hysteria coming from the elitist, government suported scientists.
…I was going to post more, adressing how human induced global warming is a far from settled issue, and how the government scietists did their utmost to descredit the Oregon Petition. However, I am out of time for now…I will return later…
Professor Reisman, thank you for again calling attention to the all important issue of what, if any, material influence human beings have had on the earth’s climate. Your posting is another stark illustration of how large numbers of academics and pseudo-intellectuals are further defiling objective and truth-seeking scientific inquiry.
That Exxon (along with other fossil fuel producers and user industry groups) is a major rent-seeker in this matter is clear
Thus, any person or company that works for a living (seeks to receive rent) deserves nothing but suspicion for their actions. Any arguments coming from them should be immediately ignored or disdained.
Since its efforts to politicize and muddy the science while avoiding an honest political (sic) discussion have obviously been effective in frustrating policy mechanisms in the US and in protecting the ongoing subsidy that free abuse of the global commons represents, it is hardly surprising that Exxon continues to try to fund supposedly independent proxies to act on its behalf.
Any effort to contradict what amounts to the dogma du jour will be considered an ipso facto action to muddy scientific and “open” discussion.
Dennis:
You say to Dr. Reisman, “Your posting is another stark illustration of how large numbers of academics and pseudo-intellectuals are further defiling objective and truth-seeking scientific inquiry.” Thank you for summarizing so well my opinion about Dr. Reisman`s understanding of the meaning of scientific inquiry in the context of global warming.
For Dr. Reisman, the search for the best available scientific understanding means ignoring all climate researchers from various disciplines and the established scientific academies that represent the most esteemed of them through North America and the rest of the world (despite the fact that these bodies have shepherherded the science and technologies that have fueled our remarkable growth in knowledge and wealth over the past few centuries), and instead relying on farcical, fraudulent “surveys” by non-climate scientists of other scientists who do not work in the climate sciences.
And for him, the scientific method means paralysis, because Popperian falsification can only work with propositions that can verified via repeatable experiments. Alas, as for climate change we have only one world and no “replays”, we have no repeatable experiments.
As a result, Dr. Reisman in effect says we should ignore the considered advice of those who have studied Humpty Dumpty, develop no policies – even though the default is that we collectively push Humpty Dumpty off the wall, and if he falls and ther`s nothing we can do to put him back together again, then, oh well! Because for Dr. Reisman, no one has any collective responsibility, the results are simply an inevitable “act of nature” – even though we know full aware there is a looming problem resulting from lack of effective private property rights or other regulatory mechanism to price the acts that will lead to Humpty`s fall, and that there will be huge costs involved that we`ll all just have to bear.
Dr. Reisman is not willing to acknowledge the folly in this, because the institutional failure does not admit of a simple cure (at least one palatable to him – and he seems congentially incapable of seeing the rent-seeking involved in the destructive exploitation (note: NOT “homesteading”) of common resources, especially if it involves his precious fossil fuel industry or this Republican Administration and Congress.
But Dr. Reisman`s awareness of the folly of his position is betrayed by his refusal to face these points square on, but instead to either define the problem away, rely on snake oil tonics sold by those profitting from policy deadlock and on the mutually contractory positins taken by an assortment of fringe and iconoclast individuals, to blame the scientists who have been working hard in the field, and of course to villify the motives of evil Dems and Marxist enviro-Nazis.
Dennis, as to your question about the “material influence human beings have had on the earth’s climate”, surely you have some idea? Over the course of the past century + we pump growing amounts of what even “skeptic” scientists agree are gases that have greenhouse effects, reach levels now not seen for a million years, and continue to do so on an accelerating basis, and virtually all climate scientists including outliers say we have have a discernable impact on climate, including most of the 1 degree F increase seen over the past few decades, and which have already lead to a host of startling impacts – glaciers melting, Great Lake that don`t freeze, springs that start two weeks early, rapid melting of the Arctic (Alaska, Canada & Siberia), acclerating melting in Greenland and the Arctic Ocean.
On top of this, given the fact that emissions are still rising in the West and China, India and others have the pedal to the metal, scientists expect that CO2 conentrations are likely to double, in which case we are looking at further increases, mostly likely in the ballpark about 4.5 F. Does this sound like fun to you? How soon would you suggest we decide that this is no longer a joyride, but that maybe we should take our foot off the gas, and maybe even figure out how to brake this thing?
Okay, I know – I`m Chicken Little and so are the worlds` most respected scientific bodies. All of us are just trying to destroy the marvels of the world`s greatest economy, strangle it, put the shackles of enviro-nazi maoism on it, and have everybody enjoy sackcloth and ashes. So just ignore us – just just like the skeptics can also ignore the fact that fossil fuel use is getting a free ride in exploiting common resources; it`s okay not to fix that problem, right, because it means we get to subsidize present consumption by destroying resources we might otherwise find indispensable for the future.
That`s it of course – let`s consume now, I like having my needlessly wasteful consumption subsidized by my children! And who really wants to make the effort to try to understand or fix common property right failures? Far better (and easier) to assume that it`s our birthright to destroy resources we consume “free” because we don`t own them – since no one owns them, we don`t have to feel bad about destroying them. Thanks, Dr. Reisman for making all of this make so much sense!
Now, back to my trough …
Sam, I look forward to hearing more from you when you come back.
I`m sure there`s more that I can learn, but you should note that the issue about rent-seeking by scientists has already been gone through rather extensively (look at the comments on the other climate-related posts by Dr. Reisman).
There`s rent-seeking everywhere, but scientists are NOT the ones profitting off of any type of global warming policy – they don`t make policy, they simply cater to research policy priorities. The system of verifying and testingntheir work is imperfect, like any system, but there is competition fo grants, reputation, peer-review and then the review of published work by the market of investors, grantors and scientists looking fo ways to advance their own interests by making use of something intersting another has published or by showing how others are wrong. And of course there are scientists in all manner of institutions – government, academic and corporate.
There are simply no incentives that work towards a “conspiracy” of climate scientists. The fact that they agree so strongly that there are serious problem that merit serious action should merit real concern by anyone serious.
Sincerely,
TT
TokyoTom, you make some great observations. I feel Dr. Reisman has some interesting points too.
If any agency, company, or even university study has ever had any oil company funding, their results are discredited because they were funded by big oil, when oil funding may not have been used for the project or had any influence on the results. For policy agencies like CEI, the funding follows opinion. For universities, the bias attributed to researchers who have received industrial money should also be attributed to researchers who have received government funds.
Not matter what your funding source, if you engage in the debate acknowledging a small but noticeable amount of anthropogenic warming and an expected increase in the future, but are uncertain if the results will be catastrophic, moderate, or insignificant (this debate is not settled among climate scientists), you are intimidated and discredited as a corporate shill global warming denier. If you are against proposed policies to combat global warming, you are intimidated and disscredited as an ignorant of science corporate shill global warming denier.
Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence; there is an overwhelming body of evidence supporting a small anthropogenic warming over the past century (roughy 1/2 of observed warming) and futher increases are expected. Catastrophic claims are extraordinary, however, and the extraordinary evidence currently does not exist, at least for any person (I am a phd scientist in oceanography) possessing skepticism which is supposed to be a tenet of good science. I’m not speaking about Exxon per se, but if you are against proposed policies, you are labeled an evil profiteering big business or corporate shill or ignoramous.
There is not an open debate on climate change because if you possess any skepticism you are bullied and criticized, even if you acknowledge climate change. But of course, I receive oil company money in the form of academic research grants to study ocean and geologic hazards at underwater locations, using technologies that have nothing to do with oil or profits but government agencies won’t fund. (Government agencies don’t necessarily look at long term results. They don’t fund technology and instrumentation that is unlikely to rapidly succeed and be put to immediate use. In this sense, industrial applied research looks more to the future than government science bodies). The point is: I’m a corporate shill and I’m automatically a rightwing science ignoring fascist because of it, and despite me having training in ocean and atmospheric fluids, I’m somehow less credible to debate global warming than someone with a bachelors in public policy or political science becasue I am clearly a biased shill.
The pro government restriction now side severely censures debate.
Unfortunately, I feel the “we don’t know how bad this is going to be and we require better evidence before enacting costly measures” side hasn’t done a good job asserting themselves and how costly certain policies may be.
Francisco:.
You: “any person or company that works for a living (seeks to receive rent) deserves nothing but suspicion for their actions. Any arguments coming from them should be immediately ignored or disdained.”
No, of course not. I am using the term in a “public choice” sense, and referring not to one`s own efforts in a market economy to produce and sell good or services, but to efforts to use the state to extract resources from the people. When I am using common resources for free and passing the costs off onto others, with no market to price the “free” resources that I use, then my efforts to prevent the privatization or regulation of those common resources is rent-seeking.
You: “Any effort to contradict what amounts to the dogma du jour will be considered an ipso facto action to muddy scientific and “open” discussion.”
No. Think about tobacco “science”, brought to us by the same industry-funded PR groups who brought us Dr. Seitz, Mike Milloy and other climate “skeptics” (really). Some politization is inevitable, and I would not object if Exxon was arguing directly for itself about what the science means – that, after all, is what is needed for a public policy debate to function. I can hear what Exxon is saying and make some determination about how reliable that information may be. The objection is that when Exxon or others try to game the debate by creating a multiplicity of supposedly disinterested third parties that trumpet their views for them.
The behavior is perfectly rationale and I do not propose that it be banned. I`m just looking for truth in advertising, so I know WHO is speaking, because this attribution is an essential piece of information for weighing and judging what is said.
Regards,
TT
TT,
This: “There are simply no incentives that work towards a “conspiracy” of climate scientists. The fact that they agree so strongly that there are serious problem that merit serious action should merit real concern by anyone serious.” – strikes me as rather a universal statement–applicable to nearly any field of inquiry.
If so, would you feel the same about Keynesian “Economics”?
Seriously, So Many feel So Strongly that “the problems” are So Serious…
And, with this: “…but scientists are NOT the ones profitting off of any type of global warming policy…”– You’re kidding, right?
Tokyo Tom,
We have been through this discussion before in other postings regarding the issue of whether man has had and/or is having any material impact on global climate, and becoming involved in further extended discussion regarding issues that have previously been discussed will not, I believe, serve a constructive purpose. Thus, I will reiterate only a few points that I made previously.
By “material” I mean any significant impact relative to the immense natural (i.e., non-human) influences on climate. If I have attempted to make any point, it is that these natural influences on climate apparently dwarf any effect man may have, and it is these natural influences that the global warming cartel chooses to largely downplay or even ignore.
I have stated the following fact several times previously: the earth has been significantly warming since roughly 10,000 years ago. That time represented the conclusion of the last period of major glaciation and at that time a good part of North America, including almost all of Canada and a notable part of the U.S., was covered by glaciers. However, man produced virtually no significant “greenhouse gasses” until 250 or 300 years ago.
Moreover, the earth has undergone many large and dramatic changes in climate during the over 5 billion years of its existence, and throughout almost all of this time humans did not even exist.
Since the Global Warming arguments have been pretty well exhausted, perhaps it would be more fruitful to take another tack.
Any argument of the form such and such a scientific statement is true based on the “opinion of an overwhelming number of scientists” is a dead giveaway that the statement has no valid scientific proof!. (That does not necessarily mean that it is not true )
The validity of a scientific proof involves prediction and then confirmation by experiment. Examples:
The velocity of light in-vacuo is independent of the motion of the source and the observer. Proof – Michelson-Morley experiment.
Dirac predicted the existence of the positron. Proof – experimental observation.
Einstein – General Relativity predict the deflection of light in large gravitational fields. Proof – Eddington’s observation of a solar eclipse.
When asked to provide a scientific proof of something, we quote actual experimental proof, not consensus opinion.
If we take the case of widely held scientific opinions that have not yet met the test of scientific proof we have.
Dark matter explanation of galactic rotation.
SuperString Theory.
If we consider the phenomenon of gamma ray bursts, the consensus was that these pulses were so energetic that they could not be coming from outside the Milky Way. Dissenting researchers were politely considered as “crackpots”. However, experimental observations proved that the consensus opinion was wrong and the dissenters were right!
The Global Warming theory is really two separate hypotheses. A) Global Temperatures are increasing. B) The cause is man-made greenhouse gas emissions. The problem in providing a scientific proof is due to the very small size of the man-made emissions relative to the size of the atmosphere and the variation in temperature from other natural sources. The human component is imputed rather than calculated. In other words, variation due to other explainable causes are subtracted off and what remains is assumed to be caused by human activity. This approach is fraught with difficulty since the natural variability of the measurements of the known factors is of the same order of magnitude as the residual effect attributed to human activity. Furthermore, the two most important factors, sunspot activity and cloud coverage variation are not even accounted for. (Using an arbitrarily short scale – ignoring other valid data that occurred in other geological epochs is also a huge problem – this data rubbishes the computer models.)
Notice the difference in the scientific formulation of the Ozone Depletion problem. Here, predictions were made that were borne out by experimental observation – the actual detection of man-made fluorocarbon-ozone interaction chemical in the ozone hole. This is why I personally believe that the Global Warming Movement deserves the cult and junk science designation.
Tokyo Tom,
Do you ever get any?
Just curious.
Dear Dan:
Yes, I get quite a bit. After all, I live in the land of the rising libido (the locale accounts for some of hours at which I post).
As to satisfaction, more and more, including here. Quite a bit of frustration as well, but by nature we are all resistant to changing our minds, especially as to matters difficult to directly experience. We’ve evolved to create basic maps of reality useful for living and procreating, and then our minds use those maps to filter out the vast flow of data that could otherwise overwhelm and paralyze us. The result is that we find it much easier to defend our map (this happens mainly uncosciously) than to consciously keep our minds open and to rejigger the various pieces of our map.
My focus here is to try to get people to use what they already accept to take a fresh look at what the have otherwise already written off. It’s swimming upstream, but good, invigorating exercise.
Allow me to take this opportunity to link to Roy Cordato’s essay on “An Austrian Theory of Environmental Economics”. http://mises.org/daily/1760
What he has to say about environmental problems generally is quite applicable to the climate change issue:
My Trojan horse strategy is that if I can get others here to recognize that the atmosphere is a global commons with no effective property rights, then, at least as a theoretical matter, readers here might be able accept that this MIGHT lead to environmental problems and consider how such problems might be addressed.
The next step would be to go from acknowledging the institutional underpinnings of environmental problems to the recognization that sometimes those concerned about “the environment” might have a point – even if they are nasty greens who hate humanity. The hopeful follow on would be a willingness to consider that the scientists who have devoted their careers to studying the climate (or other aspects of the environment) might actually have something worthwhile to say when they identify something of concern to them (even while they would not have particular credibility as to how a response, if any, should be crafted).
In any case, I appreciate your concern, even though clearly I have slipped the bounds of reason.
Sincerely,
TT
Dan, for some reason the second paragraph of the Cordato quote was not indented. My own words resume from “My Trojan horse”; the preceing sentences are Cordato’s.
Hoffer-san:
My point was that although scientists working in the climate field are interested in grant money, they have little invested in the policy outcomes – in the if, when or how a climate change policy might be adopted. They just want more grant money to support their lives and their work.
From that view, one could just as easily argue that it is in the interests of the scientists, far from arguing that there’s a “consensus” view – or at least enough information on which to base a “do something” policy – ought to be pleased that (i) the corporate rent-seekers, paid paid pundits, political handlers and leeches and various sycophants deliberately avoid honest political discussion by muddying the science, and (ii) there are iconoclast scientists who want to emphasize all of the uncertainties in the phenomenally complex atmospheric/hydrogeologic system – because stressing the uncertainties creates more opporunities to claim that additional funding is needed.
For that reason, climate scientist ought to be very pleased with how the Bush administration has stalemated an effective policy, and just thrown research money at the problem, right? But instead the science academies and leading researchers have all been saying for more than a decade that we know enough to get started. Why have they been arguing against their own interests?
A similar point can be made about government climate scientists, at least in the US. If the government policy is to do nothing, why do a few individuals risk their jobs to speak out about scientific results that further show that climate change is proceeding, despite the best efforts of the government to silence them? Do they want to risk their jobs, simply to create controversy that will create more funding that would benefit their colleagues, but no personal benefit?
Interesting observation about Misean vs. Keynesian economics. This type of musing would be more relevant if there were similar distinct schools of opinion among the climate scientists. As I previously noted, the iconoclasts (such as Gray and Lindzen) all have mutually contradictory views. I would say there’s an impressive degree of shared opinion among the wide range of climate scientists, internationally and across many disciplines and institutions – and fin d that worth paying attention to. Yes, I would pay attention to similar coalitions concerning matters.
Regards,
Tom
Gentlemen
Tokyo Tom presents the same blind faith assertions of his as have been demolished on previous blogs. He is not worth engaging in debate or discourse save to demand he supply the proofs he was asked for some time ago (many months ago now- I’m still waiting). In the absence of validated proofs all he has to present here are repetitious, baseless assertions; same as previoulsy & already dealt with elsewhere. Worthless muck.
It is important to understand Tom proceeds from a collectivist or socialist premise, as has also been demonstrated previously. He exhibits no consistent understanding of individualism, freedom or private property, although he will twist those concepts into almost unrecognisable form to promote his environmentalist agenda. He is unwittingly self-contradictory when he does that (perhaps he really is unaware rather than completely dishonest). He is a person who reckons he is so clever he knows better than other people how they should live their lives and that they should be forced to live according to his ideology. For instance, when it was suggested that the best policy was to leave people go about their own business and develop energy sources for themselves, Tom’s immediate reponse was that people should be taxed for using carbon based energy sources. In other words he promoted coercive theft against those other people with whose choices he disagrees. People had better do as he believes OR ELSE! What a terrible conceit. Dangerous too.
The only contributions Tom makes on the VMI blogs regard environmentalism and the great global warming harangue. He contributes nothing of value about individualism, philosophy, IP law, morality (or otherwise) of force, theory of war, economic theory etc. etc. , not even a derivation of private property, let alone rigorous discussion of its nature. From him, it’s all just a rather superficial defence of enviromentalist mumbo-jumbo*; over and over and over again. Discuss the Fed and unless the Fed’s involved with CO2, or global warming or some environmentalist policy or other, you’ll never hear diddly from Tom. Ask about Austrian theory of business cycles and once again, from him, nothing. He is fixated; a single subject crank.
Gentlemen, the crank likely shills to promote some rent seeking political outfit groveling at the trough of stolen tax revenue. He’s probably been bought, sold and paid for long ago. He has nothing to contribute here.
I challenged him for the proofs (several times). You’ll should as well. Challenge him to put up or shut up!
Sione
*Who ever thought an Islander from Polynesia would be telling certain Americans like Tom to quit with mumbo jumbo! My, how the world turns.
jonsi:
I hear you and sympathize with your complaint. as scientists are human, they are as prone to any other human groups to act in the manner you say you have experienced to adopt to standardized views and to squelch or discount outliers.
I’m not condoning the knee-jerk reactions of those you run into, but dissenters in all societies are typically marginalized, scoffed and scorned – just I have experienced here. There is a parallel culture of climate change denial that does the same thing that you speak of. The phenonmenon that these different societies do the same thing in marginalizing dissenters from strongly shared beliefs is an artifact of our shared human nature (and of course does not demonstrate either the correctness of one group’s belief, or that the other guys are really bad).
But in any case I don’t suppose that the group thunk you point to affects the research or the flow of grant money, which are driven by the persuasiveness of the results or research proposal.
You state that “the ‘we don’t know how bad this is going to be and we require better evidence before enacting costly measures’ side hasn’t done a good job asserting themselves and how costly certain policies may be.” I’m sure we can agree that this is a policy issue rather than a scientific one. My view is that, as an economic/legal matter, you (and many others, including on both the left and right) have miscast the analysis.
Conceptually, the real issue is simply correcting the absence of effective private property rights or enforceable common property rights relating to the atmosphere, which is a global commons. The result is that there are no incentives to conserve the atmosphere, and pricing signals do not represent either the value of the atmosphere or the costs associated with using it as a dump for GHGs, particulates or other pollution.
What we end up with is a classic tragedy of the commons, in which everyone has incentives to use the atmosphere, with no corresponding obligations or incentives to conserve. We in effect subsidize private use of a gloabl resource bu allowing it to be used free, at the expense of our future use of it. There are no markets working to provide pricing signals.
Ignoring the problem is what is essentially costly, and fixing the problem by creating private property rights in the form of emissions permits or some comparable solution as a theoretical matter does not impose costs, but simply creates a pricing signal for goods that today have a real value but are simply not priced. The result may produce distribution effects – such as if emission rights are allocated free of charge or auctioned – but doing nothing is also a policy that has both distribution and allocation effects: not only can the market not price correctly (as there are no property rights and no transactions), but those making extensive use of the atmosphere are essentially being subsdized by all who will bear the costs of such use.
I t makes sense to fix any significant common property rights failure. We have made good progress in this recently, such as by creating transferrable property rights in fisheries. We could do the same for whales and for other international fisheries that are now collapsing for the same reasons. Some common property problems might solve themselves if the government was not itself in the way, but for onternational problems we need some type of mutlinational compacts in order to make headway.
There are costs associated with setting up a system, but subsequent “costs” are not true costs, but simply prices. There are some who deliberately miss this point, simply to mask the existing costs and transfers and to scare everyone into thinking that the status quo makes sense and is cost-free.
Regards,
TT
Walt, the oceans seabeds are littered with the carcasses of ocean vessels that either could not see or avoid the hazards ahead of them. The vessels that sank proved the existence of those hazards.
How many Earths do we have to use until we have the “experimental proof” that you are seeking?
Regards,
TT
PS: I presume you are aware that the climate models you decry were involved in the ozone/CFC alert? Are you aware that the models have also been tested against the effects of Mt. Pinatubo?
Dear Dennis:
Thanks for mentioning our past conversations. I think that you and I really never discussed these points, though the certainly have come up in my exchanges with others. (These extensive discussions and links can be found them by doing the Google search “reisman climate site:blog.mises.org”.)
I am well aware of the points you make as to climate changes in the past, and I believe that all of the geolists and paleoclimatologists are aware of them as well. I think that you draw the wrong conclusion – you seem to make the unjustified and unsupported assumpton that since climate has changed in the past, sometimes quite abruptly, there is nothing that we could do that would possibly move the climate system. You might consider that an alternate assumption, such as that the relatively stable climate system over the past 10,000 years has been a special period that we don’t want to lose by screwing around with things too much.
You state “By “material” I mean any significant impact relative to the immense natural (i.e., non-human) influences on climate. If I have attempted to make any point, it is that these natural influences on climate apparently dwarf any effect man may have, and it is these natural influences that the global warming cartel chooses to largely downplay or even ignore.”
But I imagine that most climate scientist, even most skeptics, now accept that there is a discernable human influence on climate. Given the complexity of the climate system, isn’t that rather remarkable? You might also consider that mankind’s affect on the climate system has occurred via principles of leverage, and that we have continued to put more and more weight on the lever.
Most scientists also accept that the GHGs warm the earth, and that we’ve been pumping them into the atmosphere like crazy, to levels that have not been seen for hundreds of thousands of years. Let me quote from an earlier post to you:
“Dennis, it’s undisputed that man is responsible for a 33% increase in the levels of atmospheric CO2 since pre-industrial levels and for a doubling of methane levels. The build up has been accelerating, and annual increases are multiples of what they were in the 50s, for example. CO2 levels appear to be higher than those for any period over the past 400,000+ years, and we are headed for a doubling in this century. Even if we stopped all GHG emissions today, the warming that is now under way would continue for 100 years. Scientists expect that a doubling of CO2 levels, if stabilized at that level, would lead to global average temperature increases of 5 degrees F – of which we have experienced a one degree increase so far.” http://blog.mises.org/archives/005248.asp
Perhaps you can respond to this?
Hi Sione:
My, you’re in a good mood!
Thanks for helping to expose my confused, clever, twisted and dangerous methods and motives to the blog members who choose to engage in a discussion with me.
I realize and appreciate that you have been as moderate as you could, such as in graciously indicating that I am perhaps “unwittingly self-contradictory [and] … really … unaware rather than completely dishonest”.
I make no pretense about being a pure Misean, Austrian or what-have-you, and no doubt if anyone tried to use my map of reality they would quickly fall of the edge of the world. However, I have to say that I am sorry that you not only decline to engage with me directly, but request others not to as well – without correction, how can I ever hope to overcome my ignorant self-delusion?
Unfortunately I think also that your post tells everyone a bit more more about you than it does me, so allow me to provide you and other readers with a little additional information. If this comes off as a tad too defensive, I hope you will forgive me.
First, like others, I comment on posts where I have time, interest and something to contribute. For me, that happens to mean that I find it particularly rewarding to post on climate change, but I think others might have noticed me commenting on a slightly wider range of matters (even though of course my interests are even wider, but some of these interests I engage in other fora). Sione, I do think that we have exchanged posts on the matter of third world development and ethnic conflicts (Amy Chua?), and I recall commenting on matters relating to US politics, war, the auto industry and the development of corporate limited liability – though you might not have been on all of those threads.
But of course you’re right that climate change is the topic where you’ll tend to find me most. For that, I am very grateful to Dr. Reisman, who seems to have found my befuddled commentary sufficiently interesting that he gave me the honor of directing at least one of his blog posts specifically at me. (Of course the many others who have kindly corresponded with me also have my sincere thanks.)
I’d like to think that perhaps my commentary has something to do with the fact that Dr. Reisman keeps returning to the issue of global heating/climate change, despite you and others thinking that he has put it firmly to bed (and driven a stake through it), but I hold no illusions – rather it is clear that the climate change is a hydra-headed monster that keeps trying to rise, and he realizes that a heroic effort will be needed to prevent all of misguided and/or mendacious enviros and rapacious climate scientists and envious foreigners from destroying the precious bodily fluids of the US economy.
Of course I wish it were true that I WERE a “shill[] to promote some rent seeking political outfit groveling at the trough of stolen tax revenue [, and] been bought, sold and paid for long ago” – it would certainly make my life much easier! But I’m not sure who you possiblly think I could be shilling for – what respectible enviro group would want someone who professes to care about private property and reforming environmental laws to minimize the hand of government?
As it is, I work as a consultant in Tokyo on various matters, mainly on behalf of oil companies.
I do disagree with your characterization that I am “a person who reckons he is so clever he knows better than other people how they should live their lives and that they should be forced to live according to his ideology.” Rather, I am a blockhead who has yet to be convinced by Miseans that climate change and the political discussion of it are NOT problems that can be understood under Misean principles.
As to any “ideology”, I have suggested creating private property rights to emit GHGs, and had only a limted discussion of this with Yancey (who also seems to be fuddled, and would support carbon taxes). But I have been trying to persuade people rather than strong-arm them.
Sorry, but I take offense at your suggestion that my defense of “enviromentalist mumbo-jumbo” is “superficial”. I have been trying very hard to defend that mumbo-jumbo, as I think my extensive entries and research show. However, you might also note that I defend only a very narrow aspect of that mumbo-jumbo, namely, that aspect that says that environmental problems arise from the lack of effective private or common property rights, coupled with government mismanagement and corporate statism.
Your pleasure at upbraiding me as an American for my mubo-jumbo is surprising – there are enough of us idiots (see the Bush adminstration, its foreign and domestic policies, and both houses of Congress) that I would have thought that this would have all grown rather tedious.
Finally, let me note that am a little troubled by your statement that I “promoted coercive theft” during an instance, “when it was suggested that the best policy was to leave people go about their own business and develop energy sources for themselves, Tom’s immediate reponse was that people should be taxed for using carbon based energy sources.” If you could kindly provide a link to the instance to which you refer, it would help other readers to see (and me to understand) “terribl[y] conceit[ed” and “dangerous” me and my ideology are.
I am sure the others here appreciate that you are willing to take on the thankless task of dealing with me. So let me thank you on behalf of them and Dr. Reisman. Oh, and I appreciate it as well.
Respectfully,
Tom
Dr. Reisman and others:
You might know of libertarian Ron Bailey of Reason.com, Adjunct Scholar at Cato, formerly of CEI and author of Eco-Scam: The False Prophets of Ecological Apocalypse (1993)
Ron writes this week at Reason on the Exxon/Royal Society issue in his latest piece, Confessions of an Alleged ExxonMobil Whore.
The piece explains why Bailey recently became an apostate to the “skeptics” position and now accepts that manmade global warming is occuring and is likely to be a problem.
Here is a brief excerpt that explains how Bailey’s intellectual approach to climate change played into the difficulties he had accepting the climate science:
It sounds like the disease I have is starting to spread dangerously.
Regards,
TT
Data from ice cores show significant, regular swings in both temperature and CO2 for the past few millenia. If GW scientists can tell me what caused the swings in CO2 in the past, I’m willing to become neutral on the issue. If they can tell me how humans caused them, then I’ll join Al Gore.
Even this global tempest is, unfortunately, in a teapot. While the nature of weather and global phenomena has accustomed most of us to taking them as given – beyond human influence – let’s go with the “this time we’re right” crowd and say that we “can” influence this matter by concerted action.
There remains another force of nature, one even more implacable than irradiation, hurricanes, cloud formations and ocean currents, and that is acting man.
Up to now, acting man has emitted greenhouse gases at a rate that alarms some men. These men now propose to act against such (emitting) men, and I have no doubt that they can succeed, if only by killing enough of us to get emissions down.
And this, they may very well do, without its having been any part of their original intentions. Communists acted on kulaks and other more-traditional actors in ostensible pursuit of material equity among men. That didn’t work well, because of the intrasigent resistance, even unto death, of the kulaks and other more-traditional actors.
The same will happen if we allow those of us who would impose their will on the rest of us in this matter – the imperatives served by those of us who wish to emit are so powerful (very much a matter of life and death) that together we (the emitters and those who would throttle emissions) will bring down civilization in the contest.
No prediction of environmental catastrophe compares with the human catastrophe threatened by the use of government to induce a collective response to this (government-discovered) threat.
TT,
With this: “But instead the science academies and leading researchers have all been saying for more than a decade that we know enough to get started. Why have they been arguing against their own interests?” You’re overlooking the multitudes of of “green”"start-ups” that are being spawned in “Research Parks”/”Technology Incubators” around the U.S, and the World.
The spinout, from the Edu-/State Research complexes (aka: “Universities”), of “green” Technologies into Corporate lifeforms, often bedecked, or “bearded”, by luminaries from the Ivory Tower, is a booming business.
Take this, the following link, as merely one example of a great multitude:
http://researchpark.tamu.edu/coming-october-17-texas-sbir-sttr-conference.html
I’m not too concerned about the growing acceptance of the GW “Day After” scenario. Look at the countries who signed the Kyoto treaty. Have any of them even started reducing CO2?
Americans will be all in favor of reducing CO2 in the abstract. However, when it started causing massive unemployment, watch how quickly they turn against it.
Roger, let`s say you, I and a bunch of others are a bunch of tuna fisherman. None of us owns the resource, and not of us have an ability to stop the others from using it. We`re all a somewhat worried that we may be overfishing, so we negotiate a deal where we`ll all cut back to certain levels. We all commit to sign the deal, but at the last minute I back out, and insist on the right to keep on increasing my take of tuna, saying that it will damage my economy otherwise.
Would it be reasonable for me to expect that you and others would go through with the deal to limit your take of fish?
Come on Roger, the atmosphere is an unregulated global commons. Have you no understanding how the incentives work?
As for prices, the rights to a valued resource should be controlled by someone, even if doled out pro rata to every one or given to existing users. Otherwise there are no voluntary transactions and the market can`t set a price. Or do Miseans believe in a free lunch?
Tom
Mr. Potts:
You say: “Up to now, acting man has emitted greenhouse gases at a rate that alarms some men. These men now propose to act against such (emitting) men, and I have no doubt that they can succeed, if only by killing enough of us to get emissions down.”
Why don`t you stow your hysterical hyperbole and join my thought-experiment with Roger about unmanaged common property resources (which the atmosphere is, right?). Now let`s reword your little spiel: Up to now, fishermen have caught tuna at a rate that alarms some of them. These men now propose to act against the other fishermen, and I have no doubt that they can succeed, if only by killing enough fishermen to get the rate of catches down. The imperatives served by those of us who wish to catch tuna are so powerful (very much a matter of life and death) that together we (the fishermen and those who would limit catches) will bring down civilization in the contest.”
You write elsewhere that “The best protection against any event of nature is wealth.” Do you suppose that damaging common property resources, whether tuna or the atmosphere, through free and unlimited exploitation CREATES wealth?
And when we destroy our common resources by failing to manage them, is the impoverishment of that resource and act of “nature”, or of man?
I suppose it is not necessary to kill fishermen to get them to stop overfishing, but just to give them property rights in the living, unharvested resource and they will naturally protect it. Should all of our common property resources go unprotected?
Sincerely,
TT
The atmosphere is an unregulated global commons. Have you no understanding how the incentives work?
This is because the atmosphere cannot be homesteaded, TT. You cannot hold it or place fences on it. Likewise, it is absurd of talking about a “cost” of pollution by CO2 – that is poisoning the well. CO2 is NOT a pollutant – it is a by-product of human (and animal) existence. Plants use CO2 and produce oxigen, which is a by-product of photosynthesis, or should we also talk about “oxigen” pollution now?
As for prices, the rights to a valued resource should be controlled by someone
Only scarce resources are valued by someone. Air is not scarce.
Otherwise there are no voluntary transactions and the market can’t set a price. Or do Miseans believe in a free lunch?
You cannot have a voluntary transaction on things that are not goods or services. Air is free because it exists all around us – we do not have to make an effort to use it or have it. What you are proposing is to artificially convert the atmosphere into a good and artificially have someone set a “price” on it, but that would generate an immediate calculation problem since air is NOT scarce. If what you want is to impose taxes on people that “pollute” the air with CO2, then why simply not come out and say you want government to tax people for making the mistake of living?
We are talking about climate, and climate is not a good either. You are trying to use concepts that do not apply merely because you are convinced of a problem that may not even BE a problem.
Hoffer-san:
Thanks for reminding us of the fact that we have plenty of technology to handle the effects of establishing private property rights or other system to manage GHG emissions.
As soon as any kind of system is in place, private transactions (or taxes) will create prices on the use of the atmospheric commons. The simply establishment of this pricing mechanism will create the incentive that will create the demand for the technologies you refer to (while having “free” use dampens demand). Government subsidies are not needed.
Regards,
Tom
TT:”Would it be reasonable for me to expect that you and others would go through with the deal to limit your take of fish?”
You’re scenario illustrates one of the problems of using analogies as a means of argument: People always carefully craft the analogy to make sure they win the argument. Is your tuna analogy equivalent to the GW situation? Not at all. With overfishing, it should be obvious to all parties that the number of fish caught is declining. To make your analogy more appropriate, you would have to rewrite it to say that some people thought the catch was shrinking while other thought it wasn’t. Those who thought the catch of Tuna was declining proposed that everyone reduce their catch by an agreed upon amount. In that case, what incentive do those who disagree that the catch is declining have to join the reduction?
Americans are glad to join the GW hysteria while it costs them nothing. Wait until the costs start to rise, which they will. Then people will begin to pay more attention and ask serious questions, like those from my Senator, Jim Inhofe, in the other thread for today. I’m very proud of Senator Inhofe’s stand.
The Europeans are showing us the way. They’re about as hypocritical as people can be on the Kyoto treaty. They rushed to sign it, knowing full well they had no intention of implementing it. The U.S. has been more honest until now. But pay attention to California jover the next few years. They’re very proud of their GW initiative; but like the Euros, they won’t take any significant measures to curb CO2.
TT,
There’s no shortage of Technological Know-How.
There’s an extreme shortage of rational thinking coupled with a gross oversupply of Government interference and its induced ignorance/mendacity.
The focus on GHGs is a canard. Real pollution(clean Air, clean Water, clean Soil depletion) problems, many hardily abetted by the same “Government”(s) that are oh so concerned about CO2, are going for want of proper attention.
The idea that this/these same “Government”(s) can enforce a Global “Cap ‘n Trade” GHG-emission system is beyond the Pale. These same “orgs” can’t/won’t even agree to incentivize the holders of the remaining Rain Forestsinto ceasing their, the RF’s, continuing destruction.
TT,
You should snap out of it, I think your time might be better used by illuminating the, literal, destruction at the end of many of the chains of demand most of us are pulling.
inadvertant html error: Forestsinto should be: Rain Forests (a readily knowable commodity + Nature’s great “destroyer” of CO2) into ceasing…
TT:
Yes, creation of wealth invariably entails the consumption of natural resources, and this includes resources in “unregulated commons.”
If a system in which every person (and ONLY natural persons) on earth could own an equal right in the composition of the atmosphere AND anyone who desired to do anything (like plant a crop of corn) that could alter that composition could find a market in these rights so as to purchase what was economical for their undertaking (see any transaction costs here?), then I’d be all for it. Privatization of commons is a fine principle, and I’m all for it wherever it can be attained.
It’d be a much tougher commons to police than the fish in a certain region of the ocean (see any enforcement costs here?).
And I’ll bet at least SOME governments would want to tax the (rights) trade, too, just in case the other difficulties aren’t sufficient.
SOME people might even see their interests in a HIGHER concentration of CO2 in the atmosphere (say, Siberians), and might GIVE their rights away, or at least value them less than you might think they should.
I think that enforcement/monitoring effort could be the real killer, here. And I DO mean killer.
Roger/ Hoffer-san/ Francisco/ Mr. Potts:
Alright – finally some hard questions and some signs of a common ground!
What we have in the atmosphere, oceans, the rain forests and other resources that, as Mr. Hoffer points out, face “literal destruction at the end of many of the chains of demand most of us are pulling” (or if not “destruction” then continual degradation) are open access commons.
That is, as Ron Bailey (Reason & Cato) points out in his quote above – “people pollute air, rivers, overfish, cut rainforests, and so forth because no one owns them and therefore no one has an interest in protecting them. One can solve environmental problems caused by open access situations by either privatizing the commons or regulating it.”
But the result of not having any meaningful property rights is not simply that no one has an incentive to protect them, it’s that the whole system of pricing goods is skewed, and people do not receive pricing signals that reflect the circumstances of the resource.
The overall phenomenon is more simply analogized as the “tragedy of the commons”, as I am sure most of you know. Future consumption is sacrificed to present, “free” consumption. Where there are negative external effects relating to use of open access resources, those suffering the effects in effect subsidize the use, as the externalities are not reflected in the price of the resulting goods.
Mr. Potts seems to agree in principle when he says “Privatization of commons is a fine principle, and I’m all for it wherever it can be attained”, but acknowledges the many practical difficulties. Well so do I – but we can’t solve the practical difficulties by ignoring, denying or defining away these various types of problems. We must face them squarely. And I mean all of these problems, as Hoffer-san would have it, not simply climate change, which is simply one of the most prominent and sticky one of them.
Miseans should recognize that the solutions lie in establishing private property rights and, in much of the corrupt third world, establishing the rule of law and moving “common” resources out of the hands of the government and into private hands. Problems with fisheries and whaling could be easily solved by creating ownership systems; others are a quite a bit more difficult – but we should discuss and consider and not shirk this difficult task.
Francisco is still struggling with denial that this iis the problem – at least in the case of climate change. Well Francisco, putting the atmosphere aside for the moment, can you tell me how you apply your principles to open-access resources in general? I am sure you recognize that every resource actually has physical limitations – even though it may seem endless, especially when demand is low.
But the history of mankind has been economic and population growth and, with increasing demand, “free” and common resources have everywhere come under stress. Where homesteading works, these resources have been privatized – frequently at the cost of the preexisting natural ecosystem for which there was natural owner to manage. Where privatization has not worked, we have abuse and destruction, frequently through corrupt and/or ineffective government management, manipulated by national elites for their own benefit.
That’s as true in the US as elsewhere, although perhaps we have slightly better management and more open political wrangling and stalemate between competing interest groups.
Francisco, the atmosphere is a scarce resource. Our use and manipulation of it certainly have consequences. The problem is not those consequences per se, but that fact that, unlike other private transactions or economic activity involved private resources, no one owns the resource and users have no responsibility for the consequences.
I wholly agree with Reisman about the creation of wealth through the manipulation of privately-owned resouces in ones’ environment, but where the use is of unowned, public access resources, unfettered use involves not only the creation of private wealth, but also the destruction of common wealth, as I have noted to Mr. Potts.
How do we resolve problems relating to open-access resources that are effectively unowned? In many cases only with difficulty, but we should frankly acknowledge the problems, triage them and start working on solutions to the most pressing (plus the ones most easily solved). I share the sentiments of Ron Bailey, as noted in my quote above:
“One can solve environmental problems caused by open access situations by either privatizing the commons or regulating it. It will not surprise anyone that I generally favor privatization. That’s because I believe that the overwhelming balance of the evidence shows that centralized top-down regulation tends to be costly, slow, often ineffective, and highly politicized. As a skeptic of government action, I had hoped that the scientific evidence would lead to the conclusion that global warming would not be much of a problem, so that humanity could avoid the messy and highly politicized process of deciding what to do about it. Unhappily, I now believe that balance of evidence shows that global warming could well be a significant problem.”
Roger seems unwilling to recognize that there are common characteristics to negotiations among different interested parties over how to manage open-access common resources. Such negotiations involve differing calculations of interest and intense gamesmanship, and are plagued with problems of free riding and cheating, as I have been trying to show through a simple analogy.
Roger, Francisco and Mr. Potts, I realize that the real world is actually much more complicated than the apparently simple case of tuna, and that the intested parties even in that simple case can’t seems to come to an agreement. This prompts the concern expressed by Hoffer-san – do we really have to destroy all of our common property resources? Open-access commercial fishery stocks around the world are crashing, with fish farms taking their place (and the caged fish being raised on the noncommercial fish and krill also being stripmined from the ocean).
Additional levels of complexity are added to many multinational negotiations in that of course there are competing interests within each state, with those who have benefitted from inaction naturally reluctant to give up that benefit without compensation (Exxon).
The other complexity is that we all have difficulties changing our minds (me too). While fossil fuel providers can be persuaded by providing an alternate benefit (the government naturally tends to pork such as funding for new technologies, but less damaging alternatives could be the free allocation of emission rights or the reduction of other, senseless regulations), what’s in it for anybody who changes their minds? Simply pain in facing rather than dodging hard choices? Doesn’t seem fun boys, I know.
Your considered reactions are appreciated.
Regards,
That dangerous, conceited, confused arch-enviro Nazi-Maoist environmentalist who is trying to destroy the magnificent US economy for his personal satisfaction and hides behind the name
“TokyoTom”
It’s been said on this thread that Europe is doing nothing about CO2 emissions but talking about them. That’s true only metaphorically – a cap-and-trade scheme HAS been implemented in Germany and other such places.
And it isn’t pretty on any score. Aside from the likelihood that it won’t have effects at anything like the committed-to magnitude, it’s expensive and very contentious politically (surprise!).
For those who have subscriptions to wsj.com, see the recent article at http://online.wsj.com/article/SB115793765073859061-search.html?KEYWORDS=germany+co2&COLLECTION=wsjie/6month.
Tom:
Suppose we had the ability to turn a dial and control the global thermostat. Are you saying we should turn the temperature down? A more fundamental economic question if we had this ability on what basis should it be decided whether to turn the temperature up or down. The market? Governments? Environmentalists? Larry Ellison (who has just bought out a stretch of beachfront property in Malibu)?
On a point of rhetoric, if the ocean temperature had been warmer, the Titanic would not have hit an iceberg in the first place!
Walt:
Thanks for the comments.
By definition, as long as an open-access common resource isn’t effectively managed, no one in particular has the right to make management decisions about the resource, but only personal decisions about whether to continue to use it or (depending on the nature of the resource) sit back and let others catch the last fish or to invest in limiting downstream externalities while competitors go blithely on polluting.
But everyone has a right to say – hey wait, we need to do something to create incentive to conserve this resource/ stop the pollution, or to say – nah, there’s really no problem (to defend the free grazing/polluting rights one already has).
We should recognize the nonsense in this situation, in that since no one has an ownership right, no one can express their preference through market transactions. We may be left with a war of words, while Rome burns.
I would be content, if we had enforceable and transferable property rights in the atmosphere, simply to let the myriad of actors in the world to express their preferences the old fashioned way – by putting their money where their mouth is. I take the same approach to whales and other common resources.
Mr. Potts:
Thanks for your observations. Yes, the Europeans have an EU-wide trading system that will handle trades between firms in different countries, each of which developed it own plans to distribute rights – I helped to provide information on it to the Japanese government, which has Kyoto commitments that it has not yet rolled out to industry. The experience of the EU countries can of course inform whatever the US does.
Let me repeat two related points on lagging compliance with Kyotro and costs. First, as I pointed out to Roger, the EU and others have little incentive to comply unilaterally with Kyoto when the US, China, India and others refuse to accept any burden. This is simply in the nature of rational behavior in a multi-player, tragedy of the commons game.
As to costs, let me quote from Ron Baileyof Reason:
Regards,
TT
TT,
You keep talking about “creating incentive” for those Suppliers who are currently abusing their position(s), maybe you should inspect the realm where those who “Demand” punish ill-serving “Suppliers” by “Defunding to Defend”.
Francisco is still struggling with denial that this is the problem – at least in the case of climate change.
No, my issue is with your misuse of concepts. Climate is NOT a good nor a resource. It is a state, a system, but not a good. It is a conceit to think that people can “manage” it like you manage your garden.
Well Francisco, putting the atmosphere aside for the moment, can you tell me how you apply your principles to open-access resources in general?
Any SCARCE resource can be better managed by property rights – because its own scarcity would generate the Tragedy of the Commons scenario very quickly, as people would try to grab as much of such resource as possible. However, it is important to understand what is implied by the concept of “resource”, which cannot be applied to everything. Climate is NOT a resource, since it cannot be transformed into a product. It also cannot be managed in any meaningfull way.
I am sure you recognize that every resource actually has physical limitations – even though it may seem endless, especially when demand is low.
Resources are those that man decide. Not everything is a resource, and any resource being used will follow the law of diminishing returns, meaning that resources that become scarcer will indicate this to man by way of higher prices. Again, climate is NOT a resource.
But the history of mankind has been economic and population growth and, with increasing demand, “free” and common resources have everywhere come under stress.
It is in fact nothing more than a Malthusian fantasy. Common resources only come to be stressed when property rights are not enforced, but again: climate (even GOOD climate) is not a resource.
Where homesteading works, these resources have been privatized – frequently at the cost of the preexisting natural ecosystem for which there was natural owner to manage
Excuse me… a WHAT?? What is a “natural” owner? And ecosystems are in a constant state of flux, which means that every second all ecosystems become “preexisting”, which renders the concept meaningless.
Where privatization has not worked, we have abuse and destruction, frequently through corrupt and/or ineffective government management, manipulated by national elites for their own benefit.
Where it has “not” worked means that there was no privatization to begin with.
Francisco, the atmosphere is a scarce resource. Our use and manipulation of it certainly have consequences.
TT, the atmosphere WOULD be a scarce resource if you converted air into something that is NOT air. However, you are shifting the focus by implying we humans are changing the atmosphere into something else, which we are not.
The problem is not those consequences per se, but that fact that, unlike other private transactions or economic activity involved private resources, no one owns the resource and users have no responsibility for the consequences.
That is because the atmosphere cannot be owned – it cannot be privatized or homesteaded, nor can you place fences on it. Since the air is constantly circulating, “your” air quickly becomes “someone” else’s air very rapidly – a voluntary exchange would not be possible and thus no market prices, which means you cannot calculate costs.
As for the consequences, you require a benchmark to figure them out. This is why the doomsayers talk about climate change as if climate was always constant and beautiful before humans.
Francisco, thanks for your long post. It seems to me that you are hanging yourself up on definitional issues because of your reluctance to acknowledging that there is a problem that we need to face. That the problem is a difficult one to deal with I think you do a good job of making clear.
You want to distinguish between resources and the states of systems; on further review I hope you can see that the distinction collapses because the use of resources alters the state of one or more systems. In the case of the earth`s systems, it is only when the states are altered in ways that are material to us that were are concerned.
An example may be useful. Let`s say all of mankind lives in a terrarium, and you manage to reach outside, and fiddle with the controls, in effect turning up or turning down the heat. Have you affected me? Yes. Did you alter a resource or change a state of the system? Call it what you will, but it doesn`t matter. If there are no property rights relating to what you`re doing, perhaps you could ended up “homesteading†the right to fiddle with the controls, in which case I and others can enter into understandings with you as to when you will do what, and any compensation you will receive for your actions or forbearance. Or, possibly, there might be a struggle over the controls, with the effect that you cannot act freely and community rules apply to the controls. In any event, as long as people care about what you do with the controls, some type of rules-based system will develop.
What`s different in the case of man`s impact on the climate? There are lots of factors that affect the climate, and since we live inside the terrarium we have no influence over things that happen externally, but we`ve found that some of the “controls†are internal, and that our economic activities ARE changing the controls, in ways that matter to us (benchmarking is difficult, Francisco, but a discernable human impact on climate has now been acknowledge). Dr. Reisman say that our fiddling with the controls is “naturalâ€, but it clearly is not, at least in the sense that the change in the controls is external to humans. The only sense in which our changing the controls can be said to be natural is that no effective rules have yet developed to govern how we monkey with the controls, so we continue to behave individually in ways that benefit each of us individually, even though we know that the consequences are to turn the controls in one direction.
Even if we lived in perfect libertarian state, we would be having this discussion about climate change, because we just found out that some of the controls are in the inside of the terrarium and we can do something about them. The discussion is simply over when (if ever) we will decide to develop rules about our behavior that changes the temperature controls in ways we find disadvantageous.
Miseans might say that they never want to agree to any such rules, but they should recognize that human history has been all about how such rules develop when individuals realize that their aggregate behavior is sufficiently deleterious that they find it worth the effort to sit down and develop common rules.
I recognize that it is rather novel that we are now discussing issues with terrarium-wide impact, but that`s where are technological and organizational abilities have led us. We presently have no ability to affect the outside controls to the terrarium, but say that we could. Would Miseans argue that we should never tinker with those controls in ways that maximize our aggregate interests? Say, for example, that our telescopes and computers tell us that we will be smashed by a particular asteroid in a few years, but we have the ability to divert the asteroid – should we take aggregate action to mitigate the threat, or simply prepare to adapt to the consequences?
BTW, you`ve accurately described one aspect of open-access resources – the case where there is a particular, limited resource that all find valuable and compete to secure. These problems are solved by creating private property rights that are either wholly private or subject to agreed communitiy rules. You`ve missed the flip side, which is when open access means that some are able to act in ways that maximize private but have negative downstream effects. If no clear or enforceable rules develop, it is impossible for those negatively affected to engage in transactions with those creating the negative effect. Thus, absent state action, we end up with runaway pollution – until the polluter finds it in his own self interest to stop. Such self-interest may be persuaded in any number of ways, including offers by third parties who find the “pollution†to actually be valuable, other changes in technology, community suasion etc.
Climate change falls into this latter type of open-access resource problems. Properly understood, dealing with climate change is not focused on stopping the negative effects or the activity that causes them, but simply in creating rules that allow make it in the self-interest of those who are creating negative affects to take into account the interests of those who are affected.
We are in the middle of community negotiations about the creation of climate change rules. As part of the discussions, it seems to me that everyone is naturally trying to maximize their self-interests. I am sympathetic to all sides, but think that it is clear that we need at set of rules that acknowledge the negative effects, and would like to get past the policy blockage.
It seems to me that at the core of the policy blockage –both nationally and internationally – are distribution issues. These distribution issues need to be resolved in order to move ahead. Those who create the negative effects deny them, when they actually have a fairly strong argument that they have “homesteaded†rights to emit GHGs. For this, perhaps the easiest path to a solution is to expressly provide GHG emissions rights to existing large-scale emitters (contributions by individuals are nominal and can of course be ignored), and to compensate them if their share under any collective cap is less than their current emissions. Likewise, certain developing countries have a point when they argue that the application of any limits to them is unfair in view of the fact that up to now the problem is due wholly to the industrialize economies. How do we get them to agree to a cap, except by a combination of carrots in the form, of subsidies for new technologies (as Bush is doing) and sticks (trade sanctions – which Bush and the EU ignore)?
As to other natural systems, I meant that privatization occurred when there were NO prior, natural owners. I stand by my point that there is frequently much lost when various open-access resources are privatized, as no one had enforceable interests in the whole of the resource, and “privatization†is often simply extracting the valuable resources and then moving on. Brazil is converting its Amazon into soybeans, and there`s no market through which we can express our preferences for tropical forests and the wealth of species they hold and the climate functions they perform, either there or elsewhere around the world. The economy and populations of the more arid portions of the Midwest are collapsing; thus the talk of reestablishing a “buffalo commons†there. But these are other topics.
Regards,
Tom
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