5
Environmentalism Plays On Our Fears
Defects of empirical knowledge have less to do with the ways we go wrong in philosophy than with defects of character: such things as the simple inability to shut up; determination to be thought deep; hunger for power; fear, especially the fear of an indifferent universe. David Stove (1990)
Side by side with the antihuman bias of environmentalism there is its logical opposite: fear for ourselves and our species. As we have seen, the environmentalist attitude towards humankind is a two-sided coin – and, paradoxical as it may seem, so is their attitude towards the environment itself. The love of nature that is the sine qua non of environmentalism has its dark side: fear of nature, and the realization – which must remain unspoken – that nature is indifferent to us. Just as the loving god of the evangelist has his vengeful side (“vengeance is mine, sayeth the Lord”), so too nature is portrayed as ready to smite us with apocalyptic disasters in recompense for our environmental sins. The Lovearth network (www.lovearth.net) is completely typical in sporting the following slogan at its website: “Forming a unity of one percent to stop our extinction.” However, the extinction of the human species due to its own effects on the environment is not even a remote possibility. Of course, other things might wipe us out, such as impacts from the huge comets or rocks that periodically collide with our planet. Other species have survived even such impacts, however, and there is every reason to believe that what they can do, we can do. No other species is as resourceful, as mobile, as organized, as able to use diverse sources of food, clothing, and shelter. If any other species survive, so will we. We have already survived the ice ages. Again, to point out what should be obvious, beside such things as impacts with huge extraterrestrial bodies and the ice ages, our environmental effects will be small potatoes. Of course, many threats short of extinction of the human species have been raised by environmentalists. People are frightened with the specter of rising sea levels should global temperatures go up. Rapid rises of 30 meters or more, and the subsequent devastation of the great coastal cities and many low lying areas, were once commonly predicted, and still are common in school texts that present the topic of global warming. People are not reminded that the largest area of arctic ice floats on the sea, and that when floating ice melts it decreases in volume to occupy precisely the same space as before, thus causing no rise in sea level. (You can see this for yourself by letting ice cubes melt in a glass of water that is full to the top; the water level does not rise as the ice melts; ice floats only because water increases in volume as it freezes.) People were not told that even in the worst case scenario of global warming the bodies of ice on land, in Greenland and Antarctica, would require many centuries to melt (Bentley 1997), if they melted at all, since the most reasonable models predict a buildup of glaciers as evaporation, and hence precipitation, increases, canceling thermal expansion of ocean water to yield no appreciable net change in sea level (Bugnion 1999).
People were presented with frightening accounts of the break-up of the Ross ice shelf on the water offshore from Antarctica. They were not informed that the shelf is formed by glacial ice flowing from the continent to float out on the open ocean, where it forms, a huge sheet of ice, the size of France, attached only at its edges to the land. It is called an ice shelf to indicate that it is unsupported except at its edge, but even the word, “shelf,” is a misnomer, since the ice is thousands of times wider than it is thick, quite unlike any shelf. This floating sheet of ice must periodically break up as it gets too large to withstand perpetual buffeting by wind and sea. In fact, only bits of the “shelf” have broken off, as they have always done. It was dramatically stressed that the ice that broke off amounted to the size of Rhode Island, which sounds very impressive, but no one was reminded just how tiny Rhode Island is in comparison to the whole ice sheet, which is (to repeat) the size of France. People were told nothing that would reveal just how overblown this event was, and they certainly were not informed that satellite studies show that the total amount of Antarctic sea ice, including that of the Ross Sea itself, continues to grow year by year (Parkinson 2002).1 When it comes to rising oceans, people were not even provided what is common knowledge among the scientific community, namely that a steady increase in sea level was noticed even in ancient times as the tide-free Mediterranean slowly crept up the side of historical monuments over the centuries. And they were not told that the rate has not increased at all during the recent period of in which global warming has been reported 2 (Luick 2000, Luick and Henry 2000, Nerem 1997). And yet, despite these obvious failures of the rising oceans scenario, it still figures prominently in environmentalists' apocalyptic visions.3 It is easy to be misled when the prestigious and high-profile United Nations science advisory group, the IPCC (Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, 1990) predicted a rise as high as 3.67 meters [about 14 feet]. To be fair, they have steadily
1
An easily accessible report of this research is given on the Goddard Space Flight Center (NASA), as its Top Story for August 22, 2002. See http://www.gsfc.nasa.gov/topstory/20020820southseaice.html 2 An easily accessible account of the research Luick reports is given by BBC News, online, Wednesday, 22 November, 2000; see: http://news.bbc.co.uk/hi/english/sci/tech/newsid_1035000/1035489.stm. According to Dr. Wolfgang Sherer, director of the National Tidal Facility (NTF) of Flinders University, South Australia, which undertook the research, “There is no acceleration in sea level rise – none that we can discern at all.” Nerem (1997) belatedly came to the same conclusion after having earlier published mistaken results from NASA’s TOPEX/POSEIDON satellite showing an anomalous rise in sea level (1995a) of about 1 cm per year (100 cm per century). Then, after learning of a software error in the earlier computations, this was corrected to 0 millimeters per year. Finally, yet another source of error was discovered (Hancock and Hayne 1996), yielding a new result of “roughly 2 millimeters per year”, well within the long term background average of about 18 cm per century. Some scientific analyses cast doubt even on this un-newsworthy finding, such as , Hendricks et al (1996), citing too many sources of variability to permit detection of this weak signal in the oceanic noise – a typical, and valid, criticism of studies in support of global warming. It is of more than passing interest, given the huge socio-political and environmental significance of the global warming hypothesis, that while NASA’s earlier results showing accelerated rise were given prominent publication (Nerem 1995a, 1995b, Minster et al 1995, White and Tai 1995), the corrected results were confined to a very brief letter to the editor of Science. 3 At the time of this writing, for instance, the prominent popular science journal, Scientific American, featured an article with the alarming title “Defusing the Global Warming Time Bomb” (Hansen 2004), which warns that global warming might result in “explosively rapid” (p. 74) disintegration of glaciers, and sea level rises of “several meters or more” (p. 68).
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backed down from this worst case scenario to “project a sea level rise of 0.09 to 0.88 m [4 to 35 inches] for 1990 to 2100, with a central value of 0.48 m [19 inches]” for the current century (2001a, Chapter 11, Executive Summary). Still scary enough. But why the changing of forecasts over time? And how seriously should we take them? Well, people do not generally understand that the IPCC contains no scientists at all: it is comprised entirely of UN countries. Each participating country is represented by appointed politicians, who in turn consult whatever scientific sources they themselves appoint (usually assembled into “Working Groups”), and then vote on what to include in their official reports. It is not generally understood, but the highly influential scientific findings of the IPCC are okayed by a vote among member nations, on the advice of scientists and others who are also political appointees. We have already seen how such international bodies can be manipulated politically to act in defiance of the interest of the general good in Chapter 3, in the case of their refusal to permit use of small amounts of DDT to prevent millions of deaths by malaria every year. The IPCC also promotes international policies, so we must at least consider the possibility that political machinations have played a role in their acceptance. Most important here is the Kyoto Protocol, which requires its members to reduce greenhouse gas emissions 7% below their 1990 levels by 2012. Interestingly, the Kyoto Protocol explicitly exempts developing nations from these targets – something that can only be explained by the political necessities of its acceptance. So clearly political forces play some role in environmental policy. Every report of the IPCC (1990, 1992, 2001a, 2001b) warns of a wide variety of environmental nightmares, too many to address individually. However, the central threat it proposes, global warming due to greenhouse gases produced by human beings, is so huge that other environmentalist warnings shrink to insignificance beside it. We must recognize, however, right here at the start, that a thorough or conclusive study of this issue is impossible, given the purposes of this book. A brief introduction to the issues is necessary, however, and will be essayed, largely by way of footnotes and references. The idea is not to close the book on the subject, but rather to show that it is still open. For that reason, this introduction will challenge conventional wisdom on this subject. Our knowledge and understanding of these issues is still in flux, and has yet to achieve maturity. The philosophical lessons, however, are more durable. With these qualifications, let us begin. Case 5: Global “Greenhouse Warming” The IPCC bases its warnings of global warming on computer models, known in the trade as general circulation models, (or GCMs). The shortcomings of these models are well known, and often discussed in the scientific literature. For instance, the range of disagreement between GCMs is several times larger than the predicted rise in temperature agreed upon by the IPCC. And yet they provide the basis for the hypothesis of global warming, in violation of normal scientific standards. The basic metaphor supporting the theory is well known: a greenhouse. The core idea is that in a greenhouse the glass walls and roof permit white light coming from the sun to travel unimpeded inside, where it warms the plants and soil, but then trap this heat by reflecting it back inside when it is emitted by plants and soil as infrared radiation. It is said that the earth is Chapter 5 Page 3
like a greenhouse when it comes to this basic mechanism, with carbon dioxide (and methane) as the glass. Sunlight comes through the atmosphere without warming it; the sunlight is (partly) absorbed by the surface of the earth (water, vegetation, soil), heating it; the surface in turn emits radiation in the infrared; this radiation is then is reflected back towards the earth by greenhouse gases, effectively trapping it in the atmosphere, and so the temperature rises.4 Global greenhouse warming in the above sense has been occurring since the earth was formed, and explains why it is not baking on it sunny side, and freezing on its shady side, like the moon. Anthropogenic greenhouse warming is supposed to be a more recent phenomenon, due to the fact that some of the greenhouse gases are produced by us (that is, are anthropogenic): we release carbon dioxide into the atmosphere by our use of fossil fuels and clearing of forests for farming,5 methane (another greenhouse gas) is produced by rice paddies and the digestion of our cattle,6 etc. Hence both energy use and agriculture are identified as environmentally destructive. And so the greenhouse gets warmer and warmer. This “Runaway Greenhouse” theory sounds pretty persuasive, and, at a first pass, very scientific. It also plays well to our sense of guilt. But the charges against us are based on risky extrapolations from an over-simplified – and (as we shall see) misleading – model. When early GCMs showed minimal warming (mere fractions of a degree) given even a doubling of carbon dioxide, global warming modelers introduced a water vapor factor to multiply the effect many (2 - 10) times. They reasoned that a slight carbon dioxide warming would increase the amount of water vapor in the atmosphere, since the water carrying capacity of air increases with temperature. They assumed that water vapor would then cause more warming, since it, too, is a greenhouse gas.
THEORETIC ROLE OF WATER VAPOR IN GREENHOUSE WARMING
SMALL CO2 INCREASE TINY RISE IN TEMPERATURE SMALL WATER VAPOR INCREASE BIG RISE IN TEMPERATURE
Again, this sounds plausible enough – were it not for the fact it tells only part of the story when it comes to the role of water vapor. Promoters of the anthropogenic greenhouse effect always neglect to mention that water vapor is by far the most important green house gas, with a broad absorption spectrum that dwarfs that of carbon dioxide. There is, moreover, fifty times as much water in the atmosphere as carbon dioxide. And so, the real greenhouse gas is water vapor, not carbon dioxide. If we cause global warming, water vapor, not carbon dioxide,
As the temperature rises, the amount of radiation seeping through the greenhouse out into space also goes up; the greenhouse does not trap infrared radiation with perfect efficiency. The temperature finally stops rising, and thermal equilibrium is achieved, when the radiation seeping out into space finally matches that coming in from the sun. Equilibrium is entirely a matter of radiation balance. 5 Combustion of fuels, of course, produces CO2; cleared forests produce CO2 through being burnt, being metabolized by insects or micro-organisms, or via slow oxidation due to exposure. 6 Methane is produced by the micro-organisms that live in rice paddies, as well as those that live in the guts of cellulose-digesting animals like cattle, goats, and sheep.
4
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will be the main causal factor – even according to the environmentalist theory itself, as the previous chart shows. Environmentalists focus on carbon dioxide, however, because that is where we are supposed to enter into the drama, as greedy, car-driving, oil-spilling, forest-burning, environment-destroying villains.
POPULAR ENVIRONMENTALIST GREENHOUSE WARMING THEORY
HUMAN BEINGS SMALL CO2 INCREASE omitted BIG RISE IN TEMPERATURE
Okay, fair enough. If we are to blame for global warming, environmentalist scientists have every right to rub our noses into the carbon dioxide we produce. Environmentalism is primarily designed for action, not for philosophical understanding. Our goal, however, is the latter. But environmentalists have other reasons for drawing attention away from the role of water vapor – and they are not so easily excused in the name of activism: Ë Water vapor not only acts as a greenhouse gas, but also forms clouds, which cool the earth by shading it from the sun. Ë Water vapor plays the starring role in the atmospheric mechanisms which expel heat into outer space. As we have seen, the role of water vapor in greenhouse warming theory (see the previous chart) is to provide positive feedback,7 so that the small warming caused by carbon dioxide – which would in itself be no cause for worry – can be amplified into a big warming, and a cause for alarm. But water vapor also causes negative feedback, primarily of the two sorts just listed. Environmentalists do not want to bring attention to this fact. Water vapor does absorb heat radiating from the earth’s surface, thereby storing heat (moist air sharply increases the amount of heat the atmosphere can hold – yet another crucial role) and warming the air it contacts. This in turn causes the warm air, and the warm water vapor it contains, to rise higher into the atmosphere where it forms clouds and mist, reducing the amount of sunlight that reaches the surface (by reflecting it
7
Some readers may notice an apparent positive feedback loop in this theory, one that is obvious in the chart: shouldn’t the big rise in temperature cause a further increase in water vapor, hence an even bigger rise in temperature, and so on, to yield runaway heating? No, not necessarily: this result can be avoided by a careful setting of parameters. Say that the CO2 rise in temperature is y degrees, and the further initial rise in temperature due to H2O is set at .8y degrees. This last temperature rise will lead to more water vapor, and yet more warming, by the amount of (0.8 x 0.8)y degrees – yielding positive feedback. Note, however, that it is not runaway feedback, since the arithmetical series, y+0.8y+(0.8x0.8)y+(0.8x0.8x0.8)y+... converges, to yield 4.0y – about what the theory requires as a final rise in temperature. While a parameter of 0.8 is fine, a parameter of 1.0 (or greater) would be disastrous, leading to infinite heating: y+1.0y+(1x1)y+(1x1x1)y+... does not converge. So the outcome of any GCM is extremely sensitive to the setting of this parameter (which must be set within a tiny range) – and this permits almost any desired outcome given the uncertainty in the data concerning the effects of water vapor. None of this, moreover, takes into account negative feedbacks, like clouds and storms, which GCMs generally cannot include, except by reduction to a parameter – making the models even less constrained by the data (or giving them even more room to be tweaked to get desired results). We discuss negative feedbacks, albeit briefly, below.
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back into space, or increasing Earth’s albedo). This is the first way in which water vapor provides cooling. The second way is by transporting heat high enough that it can efficiently radiate its heat into outer space.8 The facts are simple and well known: water vapor creates two negative feedback loops.
ACTUAL ROLE OF WATER VAPOR
SMALL CO2 INCREASE TINY RISE IN TEMPERATURE SMALL WATER VAPOR INCREASE BIG RISE IN TEMPERATURE
INCREASED CLOUDINESS
FALL IN TEMPERATURE
INCREASED CIRCULATION
FALL IN TEMPERATURE
This chart, as you can see, is exactly like the one for the theoretic role of water vapor in greenhouse warming (page 4), except that it also includes the negative feedbacks that were left out of the environmentalist theory. When it comes to the final effect of a small increase in carbon dioxide, everything will depend on just how these three feedbacks interact and counterbalance one another. Given that the theoretical models (GCMs) predicting what will happen are not terribly precise, and overall are rather primitive (leaving out various factors, or else including them merely by way of “parameterization”9), their results are open to interpretation. In fact, there is just too much room for interpretation. Given the leeway for setting various parameters (or “tweaking” the models), and the leeway for interpreting the results, it is not clear what, if anything, GCMs tell us. They seem to raise far more questions than they settle. In plain language, weather wind, cloud, rain, storms are the air-conditioning system of the earth. This system becomes more efficient, not less, the more infrared radiation it absorbs. “Greenhouse” gases really are part of this air-conditioning system, powering circulation and conducting heat (remember that water vapor, the most important “greenhouse” gas, also increases the heat carrying capacity of the air). To call
8
Ultimately, all of the solar heat absorbed by the earth must be re-radiated into space (except for that tiny bit trapped by chemical or biological processes, as in the formation of coal) to maintain thermal equilibrium, but infrared radiation from the surface and lower atmosphere is inefficient, since it is largely re-absorbed by the atmosphere above (this re-absorption, by the way, is the essence of the normal, nonanthropogenic, “greenhouse effect” that keeps our planet’s temperature warm, even, and stable). But once it is carried aloft to the upper atmosphere, it doesn’t meet this resistance, and can more efficiently escape into space. 9 GCMs generally do not model clouds, storms, or weather, as will be discussed in somewhat more detail below. The only way, then, to include such effects is as separate variables introduced into the model, that is, by “parameterization.” For instance, clouds can be included as a parameter that reduces solar heating. In doing this, the model falls back on empirical data, or other theory, but does not actually model clouds. Cloud effects are input for the model, data, not output calculated by the model.
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water vapor a “greenhouse” gas is highly prejudicial, given its air-conditioning roles: it focuses on its heating effect and ignores its cooling effects. Some scientists have concluded that atmospheric mechanisms tend to stabilize temperature (yielding a stable range of temperatures, other things equal, for any amount solar radiation; see Prentice and Sarnthein 1991). Thus the system will tend to correct for marginal factors like carbon dioxide content, which, lest we forget, comprises less than a mere four one-hundredths of one percent of the atmosphere. Given the overall tendency of the atmosphere towards stability, the environmentalist theory that the role of water vapor will be to amplify a small carbon dioxide warming via positive feedback into a large overall warming has to be viewed with cautious skepticism. It begins to look as though selective blindness is once again at work. Once we have begun to realize the one-sidedness of the role of water vapor in the environmentalist theory of anthropogenic greenhouse warming, it is only a small step to realize that there is something very odd about the greenhouse model – if indeed “model” is the right word, for it is really just a metaphor. The greenhouse metaphor portrays the atmosphere as though it were cooled only by radiation (see the top panel of the figure, “The Greenhouse Metaphor,” on the next page). In fact, without circulation of warm air – convection, weather, storms – the earth would truly become too hot for us to bear. The greenhouse metaphor is right in pointing out that infrared radiation has a hard time escaping from the surface of the earth into outer space, since it tends instead to be reabsorbed by the lower atmosphere. But it is wrong in omitting the well-known fact that warm air rises, carrying its heat into the stratosphere where it can radiate, and thus escape, into space (see the bottom panel of the figure, “The Greenhouse Metaphor”). It is atmospheric circulation that cools the earth – not radiation seeping through fixed layers of greenhouse gases. GCMs, despite their misleading name (global circulation models), do not include even a morsel of weather. GCMs employ entirely different assumptions than models of weather. In order to address the issue of global warming, climatologists developed GCMs as a simplification of actual climate processes, as an abstraction from the hopelessly complex processes of weather (and its interaction with ocean currents, land masses, deserts, lakes, etc.) towards something simple enough to portray with computers. The greenhouse model, or metaphor, was the result. In greenhouse models, data points are typically around 100 kilometers apart in space and years apart in time, whereas storms occur at scales smaller by orders of magnitude. GCMs use the greenhouse model in order to achieve computational accessibility. Computability is purchased by ruthlessly selling off the complex details that make the real climate work. So GCMs are based on the greenhouse metaphor – but it’s a misleading metaphor at best. That’s the heart of the problem with the environmentalist theory of anthropogenic greenhouse warming. Greenhouses themselves, first of all, do not work in the manner assumed; and, second, the atmosphere is not like a greenhouse (middle panel of the figure, “The Greenhouse Metaphor”). A real greenhouse is not warm because it lets in white light but traps infrared radiation, contrary to what we have been so often told by environmentalists. In fact, a greenhouse works not by radiation effects, but by disrupting circulation, by trapping warm air (rather than radiation) inside, forcing it to build up. This is known to any greenhouse operator, who cools it simply by opening up vents to let out the heat. Of course, the circulation in a greenhouse is never quite as good as it would Chapter 5 Page 7
be outside, but if the greenhouse worked by reflecting infrared back inside, as warming advocates say, then the greenhouse would stay warm with the vents open, since the small openings which permit circulation barely affect the reflective efficiency. So the greenhouse model does not even get the principles of a real greenhouse right. Worse, the greenhouse metaphor has little application in the real world except as an illustration of how the climate does not work. Neither the GCM misrepresentation of greenhouses as radiation traps, nor the actual principles of real greenhouses, correctly portrays what takes place in the real world. The carbon dioxide in our atmosphere does not act like a roof or a wall – what could be more obvious than the fact that it is a mobile component in a permanently moving sea of air? I do not pretend to deny that so-called “greenhouse” gases are what keep Earth warm, and its temperature approximately even and relatively constant. To repeat, without its atmosphere, Earth would be like the moon, freezing on its shady side and baking on its sunny side. I am, instead, denying that a greenhouse correctly portrays the function of the so-called “greenhouse” gases. They are not a roof trapping radiation (as in GCMs), nor a roof preventing circulation (as in real greenhouses). The so-called “greenhouse” gases, water vapor, carbon dioxide, methane, chlorofluorocarbons, and so on, are absorbers of infrared emitted by the Earth's surface, permitting the atmosphere to warm, thereby causing circulation, which in turn makes the atmosphere cool. Because they are a sea of absorbing gases, rather than a roof or layer of insulation, heating them from below causes circulation. This process drives circulation (convection, weather), which distributes heat from the hot equator towards the cold poles, and from the warm surface towards the absolute cold of outer space, where, by radiation, it can escape to cool the planet. Calling these gases “greenhouse” gases is a one-sided misnomer. They could just as well be called coolant gases to indicate their role in powering circulation and transporting heat away from the planet into the depths of space. The real problem the world faces is not the “runaway greenhouse effect” that environmentalists trumpet and the popular media echo. It is, instead, the runaway greenhouse metaphor that we have most to fear.10 It is a false metaphor, profoundly distorting the most relevant facts when it comes to warming. And yet, it beguiles many intelligent individuals, including scientists.11 So much so, in fact, that the empirical evidence itself is ignored, or distorted, to make room for the greenhouse metaphor. Environmentalist scientists leave professional impartiality behind, and instead argue like
10 My thanks to Christopher Essex (2000) for clarifying the greenhouse metaphor, and astutely recasting the metaphor itself as the runaway. 11 The number of scientists who traffic in the “runaway greenhouse metaphor” is so large as to defy listing here. The metaphor is central to the work of the IPCC, for instance. If they understand the fundamentally misleading flaws in the metaphor, they should bring them to our attention; if they do not, more is the pity. That scientists can be misled, or even mislead themselves, should be obvious enough, though nonscientists, at least, are prone to supposing this seldom happens. The greenhouse metaphor seems particularly seductive. The influential Dr. David Suzuki, for instance, claimed that it was the carbon in greenhouse glass that trapped the heat inside (Suzuki 1990) – even though glass contains negligible carbon. Having already gotten carried away with the greenhouse metaphor, it was apparently just a small step to get carried away with the misleading talk of the carbon “burden” of the atmosphere as the basis of its a greenhouse effect (actually it is water that is the main greenhouse gas, with carbon dioxide playing a cameo role), and then only a tiny slip to suppose that carbon is the agent of real greenhouses.
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lawyers for their client, playing up some of the evidence and ignoring the rest. Let's attempt to correct the balance somewhat with some of the evidence for the other side. Ë We are told that carbon dioxide is the primary greenhouse gas controlling global temperatures, as is shown by the correlation between carbon dioxide levels and global temperatures in the history of climate changes. ♦ We are NOT told that changes in carbon dioxide levels seem most often to follow, rather than lead, changes in temperature (Jaworski 2003, Jaworski et al 1992, Raynaud and Siegenthaler 1993, p. 182, Kuo et al. 1990).12 Obviously a cause cannot follow its effect, so carbon dioxide levels cannot be the cause of temperature changes. On the other hand, we do know that warmth causes carbon dioxide levels to rise by forcing its release from the oceans (which contain 50 times more carbon dioxide than the atmosphere), just as warming soda causes it to release its carbon dioxide.13 Ë We are told that scientists generally agree that we have already caused a runaway green house effect. ♦ We are NOT told that climatologists themselves are increasingly dubious of the hypothesis on scientific grounds. George Taylor, 2002 President of the American Association of State Climatologists, reported, “I can tell you that there is a great deal of global warming skepticism among my colleagues ... the global warming scenarios are looking shakier and shakier. ...It’s interesting to me that the tactics of the ‘advocates’ seems to be to 1) call the other side names (‘pseudo scientists’) and 2) declare the debate over (‘the vast majority of credible scientists believe...’). I’m grateful for those who... keep the dialogue open and allow us to share relevant information and scientific data....” (Taylor 2002)
12 It is interestingly persuasive that this lag is found in both small, short term fluctuations, and large, long term fluctuations. Kuo et al. conclude that “changes in CO2 content lag those in temperature by five months” on the order of months to decades, and caution against concluding that “variations in CO2 are causing the changes in global temperature” (p. 713), noting possibly causal correlations between solar output and temperature. When we turn to long term fluctuations, Raynaud and Siegenthaler conclude that ice-core data are consistent with a simultaneous change in both temperature and CO2, “but also with a lag of up to 1 Ka (1000 years).” They also note that, “During the initiation of the last glaciation, CO2 lagged by several Ka behind southern temperature,” suggesting “a mechanism of ocean internal forcing of the CO2 changes” (p. 185); in other words, warming caused the oceans to release stored CO2. Jaworski is, by contrast, more categorical: “concentrations in air bubbles preserved in polar ice appear 1,000 to 13,000 years after a change in the isotopic composition of H2O, signaling the warming of the atmosphere” (2003, p. 58). He goes on to point out that, “When the CO2 concentration was 18 times higher [than today], 440 million years ago (during the Ordovician period), glaciers existed on the continents of both hemispheres” (p. 58-9), among several other data contradicting the idea that CO2 levels cause temperature changes. 13 Human beings release some 6.3 gigatons (billion tons) of CO2 in the atmosphere yearly. That sounds like an enormous number, until we realize that natural sources put at least 150 gigatons into the atmosphere each year. We contribute only marginally to the total. The atmosphere itself contains some 750 gigatons, and the oceans a whopping 40,000 gigatons! Of course, plants require CO2, which they get from the atmosphere and oceans, and shellfish require it for their shells, and absorb it from the sea. The numbers and total mass of these organism increase when CO2 is plentiful, and vice-versa, resulting in a yearly CO2 balance to within about one part per million (a mere .00075 gigatons). As we all know, CO2 levels have been steadily rising for decades – the questions to be answered concern the causes of this rise, and its effects. The scientific answers are far less definite, and far more speculative, than many have been led to believe.
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Ë We are told by global warming advocates (notably IPCC 2001b, Section 9.5) that global warming will result in an increase of hurricanes. ♦ We are NOT told that simple observation shows both the number and intensity of hurricanes has decreased slightly over the last century (Smith, E. 1999, Landsea et al. 1996)).14 Ë We are told sensational stories about how Arctic sea ice has broken up during recent summers – this apparently the harbinger of total environmental collapse. ♦ We are NOT told that Arctic ice often breaks up during the summer: it is, after all, floating on a large, windy, and moving sea that is warmed by the sun 24 hours per day during the summer.15 Ë We are told the Arctic is warming, and that its fragile ecosystem will be destroyed. ♦ We are NOT told that the Arctic circumpolar vortex is increasing – an indicator that the Arctic is actually cooling (Davis and Benkovic 1992). ♦ We definitely are NOT told that the growing vortex counts against the greenhouse theory, since the Arctic is where the proponents of global warming themselves predict the greatest rise in temperature – but, say Davis and Benkovic, “little empirical evidence of warming over the Arctic has been found.”16 Ë We are told that global warming will bring a modern day plague of tropical diseases into Europe and North America. ♦ We are NOT told that there is no empirical evidence of this happening, and that disease is linked far more strongly to poverty than to weather (Hay et al. 2002, Taubes 1997). Ë We are told that heat waves will kill thousands (World Health Organization 2003). ♦ We are NOT told that heat waves used to kill larger numbers before the introduction of air conditioning, and that death rates fall below normal immediately after heat waves, revealing that they only hasten the deaths of those already mortally ill and too poor to afford air conditioning (White and HertzPicciotto 1985, pp. 184-9). ♦ We are NOT told that cold weather causes deaths as well, and that warming would decrease this number (M. R. White and Hertz-Picciotto 1985, p. 184, McMichael and Beers 1994).
14 In somewhat more detail, Smith says (p. 2720), “Past hurricane intensity and frequency research indicates that hurricane frequency is on the decline. However, data from 1900-98 for East Coast landfalling hurricanes support the notion that the frequency of hurricanes is beginning to increase once again after bottoming out in the 1970's, while average hurricane intensity has remained essentially steady the last 3 decades.” Landsea et al. instead consider the last fifty years, finding the same falling frequency, and that maximum intensity of hurricanes has remained constant, while average intensity has decreased. Both essays comment that this data disconfirms the anthropogenic greenhouse warming theory according to consequences drawn by its own proponents. 15 Greg Holloway, a scientist with the Institute of Ocean Science in Victoria, Canada, discovered that reports indicating a thinning of Arctic ice may be based on measurement errors. See Cambridge Conference Network report: http://abob.libs.uga.edu/bobk/ccc/cc042501.html 16 Davis and Benkovic conclude (p. 426), “Although all general circulation model (GCM) regional temperature forecasts differ under doubled carbon dioxide scenarios, there is overall agreement that the Northern Hemisphere polar regions should warm much more rapidly in winter relative to the tropics. However, little empirical evidence of warming over the Arctic has been found.” Their study considered data for the circumpolar vortex, for the month of January, from 1947-1990.
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♦ We are NOT told that even according to the proponents of global warming, it is not expected that maximum temperatures will rise significantly, but rather that the bulk of the warming will occur in minimum night time lows and winter temperatures. In short, extremes of temperature will decrease. Since health problems occur in temperature extremes and rapid temperature changes, the overall effect on human health would be positive. Ë We are told that malarial mosquitoes may move northward to infect us (IPCC 2001b, section 9.7.1). ♦ We are NOT told that there is evidence indicating no link between malaria and such small temperature changes (Hay et al. 2002). ♦ We are NOT told that it is common knowledge that malaria has been widespread in temperate zones within historical times, in temperatures essentially like our own – hence that temperature alone is not the main factor controlling its range. Temperate zone malaria gradually disappeared in the last centuries of the 19th century for reasons not understood. ♦ We are certainly NOT told that the most dramatic increase in malaria in recent history was due to the interruption of mosquito control programs over environmental concerns about DDT some 25 years ago (as we saw in Chapter 3). Ë We are told that the 20th century was one of increasing warmth, with the last decade the warmest in a thousand years (IPCC 2001a, Mann et al. 1998). ♦ We are NOT told that it was clearly warmer (1.5° C or 3° F) 6000 years ago, at the end of the last ice age (Dahl-Jensen 1998, Gagan et al. 1998, Lamb 1982, Lamb 1988, p. 20).17 ♦ We are NOT told that it was warmer (1° C or 2° F) even within the last thousand years. Indeed, farmers colonized the southern shores of Greenland in the year 896, and remained for about 500 years, until the colony was abandoned as the temperature fell with the advance of the Little Ice Age, which began in about 1400 and lasted until the 20th century (see references just listed above, as well as Keigwin 1996, and Lamb 1965). Some researchers have even reported several periods within the last 1000 years that have been warmer than anything in the 20th century (Soon et al. 2003, Soon and Baliunas 2003). ♦ We are NOT told that satellite data indicates little or no warming over the supposedly hottest decades (Spencer and Christy 1990). ♦ We are NOT told that ground and balloon measurements confirm this (Hay et al. 2002, pp. 906-8, Christy et al. 1997, Christy 1995, Spencer and Christy 1992).
The fact that this result is found by so many disparate methods is impressively convincing. Dahl-Jensen measures temperatures of ancient ice deep in the Greenland glacier, which retain traces of their temperature when on the surface. The methods of Gagan et al. are technically sophisticated, involving comparison of two ratios in ancient coral beds of the Great Barrier Reef, first of oxygen isotope concentrations (18O/16O), and second of strontium-calcium (Sr/Ca) concentrations, by which they conclude that the mean sea surface temperature 6000 years ago was 1.2o C warmer than today. The methods of Lamb are more commonplace, but for that reason perhaps less likely to be overturned by theoretical readjustments: he searches out prehistoric evidence gathered over the centuries by archaeologists, geologists, and so on. He notes, for instance, that the fossilized, carbon-dated remains of forests in Canada indicate that they reached their maximum northward extent 6000 years ago (1988, p. 20).
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♦ We are NOT told that the vast bulk of long term temperature records are from cities, and that cities form heat-islands warmer than the surrounding countryside; see the figure: “The Urban Heat Island Effect,” on the next page (for a more complete presentation of the concept, see Wypych and Bokwa 2003). Given that cities have been growing, so too has this effect, and so temperature records are open to conflicting interpretations consistent with warming, no warming, or even cooling of the atmosphere as a whole.18 ♦ We do NOT hear voices like that of Carl Wunsch (1999) of MIT's Program for Atmospheres, Oceans, and Climate, who has analyzed temperature data over ranges of hundreds to thousands of years, and modestly concludes (p. 253) “published inferences about a recent change in climate state appear very 19 fragile.” ♦ And we are definitely NOT told that recent analyses of the Mann et al. (1998) results, which are a prominent support of the thesis that global temperatures are rising (in particular for the IPCC, 2001a),20 may themselves be based on very unfortunate mishandling of raw temperature data (McIntyre and McItrick 2003).21 When these errors are removed, the data shows that the early fifteenth
Differing interpretations turn largely on the average size of the urban heat island effect. While observed effects of 10o C (18 oF) are common, in the late afternoon in the heart of large cities, the effect will be much smaller in the middle of a windy winter night in a smaller city. The prophesied anthropogenic global warming is on the order of 2o C per century, or 0.02o C per year (a mere one-fiftieth of a degree). It is, for all practical purposes, impossible to calculate the average urban heat island effect to one-fiftieth of a degree, given the continuously varying historical range of past measurements (varying architecture, industry, energy use, ground cover, etc.), for the specific times of measurement, etc. Therefore, there is an obvious, practically insurmountable, problem of picking out the global warming signal from the urban heat noise. Thus, interpretation is required, with warming advocates militating for lower estimates of the heat island effect. Without these lower estimates, the evidential support of temperature records collapses. 19 A little more precisely, Wunsch concludes that the warming trend of the 1980's and 90's is within the expected range of variation. He does not conclude that global warming has not occurred, but rather that there is no evidence that it has, since there is no way to distinguish a deterministically caused change in climate from stochastic (chance) variations. Standard, extremely reliable statistical methods, show, in effect, that the signal to noise ratio is too low to permit any conclusions about the so-called anthropogenic greenhouse effect. For the IPCC to claim (1995) a “discernible” human influence on climate is like claiming to have heard a distant gunshot in the midst of fireworks. To then amplify the claim to a “Robust Finding” that “most of the observed warming over [the] last 50 years likely due to increase in greenhouse gas due to human activities” (IPCC 2001, p. 31), given no additional evidence over their earlier study (1995), is only to go out further on the same limb. As Wunsch wisely observes, “Sometimes there is no alternative to uncertainty except to await the arrival of more and better data” (p. 253). Unfortunately, environmentalists are not waiting for the data, but rushing to judgment. 20 McIntyre and McItrick note the many uses of the (deeply flawed – see below) Mann result by the IPCC, whose reports are the express basis of the Kyoto Accord, in 2001: “it appears in Figures 2-20 and 2-21 in Chapter 2 of the Working Group 1 Assessment Report, Figure 1b in the Working Group 1 Summary for Policymakers, Figure 5 in the Technical Summary, and Figures 2-3 and 9-1B in the Synthesis Report. Referring to this figure, the IPCC Summary for Policy Makers (p. 3) claimed that it is likely 'that the 1990s has been the warmest decade and 1998 the warmest year of the millennium'' for the Northern Hemisphere. The IPCC view of temperature history has in turn been widely disseminated by governments and used to support major policy decisions (p. 752)”. 21 McIntyre and McItrick discovered various, disturbing errors in Mann's data handling, such as elimination of spans of temperature records which conflicted with the global warming hypothesis, or, in the more muted, scientific tones of the authors themselves, “unjustifiable truncation or extrapolation of source data,
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century was warmer than the present, just as the colony in southern Greenland, along with other copious historical data, would lead us to believe (Fagan 2000, Lamb 1982, etc.) – see the figure: “Is ‘Global Warming’ Based on a Mistake?” on the next page. So, it seems that the global warming hypothesis is far more fragile than we might have supposed. But fear, as we know, can flourish on a fragile foundation – a fact of human psychology not lost on environmentalists. It is hard not to think that the computer assisted GCMs of environmentalist climatologists play the same role in their science that “reason” played in medieval (Aristotelian) science: they protect theory from evidence. Reason dictated that women have fewer teeth than men, teeth being a sign of strength and women being the weaker sex and all, and so medieval scientists accepted that this was true, either failing to look in people’s mouths to count their teeth, or else refusing to credit what they saw with their own eyes. Likewise, environmentalists everywhere prefer the dire warnings of theory and model over the scientific evidence itself. If it makes sense, given environmentalist logic, to accept the precautionary principle, hence to treat possible harm to the environment as though it were actual, it follows that the mere possibility of global warming requires us to treat it as an actual threat. Models then serve merely to protect this foregone conclusion from countervailing evidence. One last issue before we temporarily put aside the case for anthropogenic greenhouse warming: there is more to the evaluation of a scientific theory than merely comparing it with the evidence it is designed to accommodate. Theories must not only stand up to the evidence, but to competing theories as well. Newton's theory of universal gravitation, for instance, handles a vast body of evidence very well, with only some minor problems, such as the orbit of Mercury. We might, therefore, conclude that Newton's theory is simply true. But this would be a mistake, for Einstein's theory has shown that the most basic ideas of Newton's theory are false. There is no such thing as gravitational attraction, but rather a bending of space-time itself by massive bodies – to name just one misconception embodied in Newton's theory. We still use Newton's theory for approximate calculations within parameters where relativistic effects are small, but, to put it bluntly, it is false. We accept Einstein's theory of relativity because it not only handles all of the phenomena that Newton's theory deals with, but solves the problems (like the orbit of Mercury) that it cannot handle as well, and then, as a bonus, goes on to reveal vast bodies of new phenomena (transformation of mass into energy via the famous formula E=mc2, increase of mass of particles in accelerators, etc.). The moral of the story is this: it is not enough that a scientific theory handle a body of evidence – it must also handle it better than its competitors. So, in order to really evaluate the anthropogenic, carbon dioxide driven, greenhouse theory, we have to take stock of competing theories as well. Sad to say, environmentalists have tended to ignore the competition, or to dismiss it out of hand.
obsolete data, geographical location errors, incorrect calculation of principal components and other quality control defects” (p. 1). On the other hand, Jaworowski (2003) is more trenchant: “How could the 1998 Mann et al. paper, with all those errors, have passed peer review for Nature magazine? And how could it pass the reviewing process at the IPCC? This affair sadly reflects upon the quality of science being performed in this body” (p. 56).
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As a matter of fact, there are many other theories that explain large bodies of the evidence to date, at least as well, or better, than the carbon dioxide theory. There are too many to permit a thorough list, but here is a sample of theories that give carbon dioxide only a minor role: Ë Ocean currents. Oceans absorb and move massive amounts of heat, orders of magnitude more than the atmosphere. They are responsible for transporting tropical heat toward the poles. Occasionally the global system of currents switches into new, semi-stable patterns (see, e.g., McPhaden and Zhang 2002, Clark et al. 2002, Broeker 1995), thereby changing global climate.22 Ë Solar variability. The sun is not constant. Changes in solar heating cause climate changes of varying degrees over various time periods (Baliunas and Soon 1995, FriisChristensen and Lassen 1991, Landscheidt 1983, Jaworski 2003, Kuo et al. 1990, p. 713). See the figure, “Our Inconstant Sun,” on the next page. Ë Normal random variations. Climate and weather form a non-linear, multivariable system (commonly known as a “chaotic” system), which will unpredictably move away from average values over various periods of time (Lorenz 1991, see also Foss 1992 for an introduction to chaos theory).23 Ë Interstellar hydrogen clouds. Outer space is not a perfect vacuum. In fact, it has its own clouds, formed of hydrogen gas. Our solar system is now in a period of clear interstellar weather, but has in the past, and will again in the future, encounter hydrogen clouds of various densities, causing various degrees of cooling, including ice ages (Paresce and Bowyer 1986).24 Ë Changes in ground cover. Measurable warming of the atmosphere immediately above ground level, where temperature readings are normally taken, is caused by deforestation, or other changes in ground cover. Evidence cited in favor of global warming can be explained in terms of these effects (Lewis and Wang 1998). These hypotheses form a very mixed bag, involving quite different mechanisms, and having various degrees of scientific virtue – but that only serves to give some idea of the range of alternatives to anthropogenic global warming. The main point here is simply that
There is a theory that warmth itself causes the Gulf stream to fail, or stop further south, by increasing fresh water flows into the Arctic and North Atlantic, and forcing the highly saline (hence dense) Gulf Stream waters to sink. This theory (whatever its merits or deficits) is used in turn to find a starring role once again for CO2: on the assumption that CO2 causes global warming, it could then trigger the collapse of the Gulf Stream via increasing freshwater flows into the North Atlantic. This argument, however, assumes precisely what it needs to show, namely that CO2 drives global warming. In short, it is circular. 23 Lorenz does not accept the anthropogenic greenhouse hypothesis because, in his own words, “The atmosphere and its surroundings constitute a chaotic dynamical system, and we cannot without careful investigation reject the possibility that this system is one where spontaneous long-period fluctuations occur” (p. 450). 24 Usually the stellar medium contains only one hydrogen atom for every 8 cubic centimeters of space. However, interstellar hydrogen clouds are much, much more dense, “with densities greater than 1000 atoms per cubic centimeter” (1986, p. 99). Normally the solar wind, blowing from our sun into outer space, blows away the interstellar hydrogen, protecting us from contact with it. The 8,000-fold increase in density within interstellar hydrogen clouds would overcome the solar wind, and Earth would find itself hurtling at its solar orbital velocity through clouds of hydrogen. What happens then? The best theory is that the hydrogen would react with oxygen radicals to form huge amounts of water vapor, clouds, and precipitation, profoundly cooling the planet – as in the ice ages. Smaller variations in the interstellar medium could cause smaller climate changes.
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the greenhouse warming theory is not the only game in town, so to speak, and that the issue is far from settled. We should also observe the wide variety of disciplines that may have a crucial role to play in the issue of global warming. Oceanography (ocean currents), solar astronomy (variable sun), interstellar astronomy (hydrogen clouds), pure mathematics (chaos theory), history (the Little Ice Age, the Greenland colony, etc>.), ...we cannot say in advance which will be most relevant to the issue at hand. Scientists who devise and use GCMs have often acted as though only their specific approach has anything to say on this issue – a view that seems extremely bold and ill-advised. There is a lesson here to drawn about the nature of “environmental science,” and we will get to it in a moment. As we consider this issue, we should remember the following: dire, prophetic warnings for humankind have been the norm through the centuries, usually based on religion, but more and more in recent centuries on science. A good example is Thomas Malthus’s (1798), who at the beginning of the nineteenth century warned of mass starvation and collapse of the human population. His model was seen as virtually irrefutable at the time (like the greenhouse model today), but proved nevertheless to be false, overlooking, as it did, a variety of factors, most notably the inventiveness of human beings. Environmentalists implicitly wish Malthus had been right, given their lamentations over the growth of human population – and, of course, they still predict Malthusian disasters. Warnings that the next ice-age was upon us were very common in the 1970’s, when lower than normal temperatures caused record low winter temperatures (Gribbin 1973, Ponte 1976). These warnings were also based upon very sound science, namely the Milankovich theory of ice-ages (1941, see also Chapter 2, footnote 1), which reveals that an ice-age is overdue (see also Ruddiman 2003). Environmentalists are, from the historical point of view, only the latest in a long series of people to predict apocalypse. One conclusion is safe, despite all of the confusion (or perhaps because of it): the mere fact that a prophecy has a scientific basis is no proof of its being right. Even sound science may lead to erroneous conclusions. Science works best when extraneous and accidental influences are controlled. In the physics lab bodies are dropped in a vacuum, for only then can we be sure of the gravitational rate of fall. In the biology lab, culture dishes are kept in a sterile environment, for only then can we be sure that they will not be contaminated with stray organisms. Cases like this could be multiplied indefinitely: science advances by considering systems in which the phenomena of interest have been isolated. Outside of the laboratory, however, there are no isolated systems. All sorts of unexpected factors may come into play, and prediction is far more problematic. Scientists are not specifically trained to deal with the intrusion of unexpected factors in the real world. Their education consists almost entirely of artificial textbook exercises and controlled laboratory experimentation. To take a concrete example, in the biology lab it is biological phenomena, and only biological phenomena, that are studied. In the real world, by contrast, a biological phenomenon may just as often be controlled by non-biological factors. How can a biologist predict next year’s population of salmon, for instance, when it depends on factors a biologist is not trained to predict? A geological phenomenon, like an earthquake which causes a landslide that destroys a spawning ground, may be the dominant factor. Or a meteorological event, like a storm which causes flooding during Chapter 5 Page 15
the run of the fingerlings back to the sea may determine the population. An economic event, as far as that goes, may determine the population: perhaps the crash of the stock market in the Philippines raises the price of food, and so encourages Philippine fisherman to fish farther from home, with the result they take more salmon as by-catch. And who would suggest a training in biology prepares anyone to predict such a chain of events? Or, indeed, that any sort of training could permit one to foretell such a thing? The point that needs to be grasped is that environmental science typically involves just this sort of problem. Understanding the environment is characterized by the necessity of looking beyond the boundaries of any one discipline in order to see the big picture – and that sounds very much like a definition of philosophy. Obviously this is a big topic, and we cannot go into it further here. We will return to it in Chapter 10. For now, we can draw a lesson from what we have already seen. Lesson 4: Understanding the environment is not a simple matter of accepting environmental science, since, more than other sciences, it speaks with many voices. Environmental understanding requires assessment of scientific findings to gauge their reliability.
Another point that needs to be thoroughly understood is that actions are not, and logically cannot, be based on facts alone. We have been addressing the factual question, but any policy to prevent or reduce global warming must also be premised on the assumption that global warming would be a bad thing. Until we can determine is effects, and evaluate them, we do not have any intelligent basis on which to act. Even then, any course of action must itself be evaluated to see whether its effects are better than other courses of action, or inaction. The philosophical message is clear. Intelligent action requires two sorts of information: 1. Reliable knowledge about the facts: - what will happen if we do not act - what will happen if we do act 2. Evaluation of these outcomes This entire picture, moreover, is complicated by the fact that we usually cannot be certain about our facts, and so must consider various possible chains of events. We will set aside these complications until Chapter 10, where the problem of acting under conditions of uncertainty will be considered in more detail. Environmentalists don’t seem to worry at all about uncertainty. Instead, they make their dire predictions in a confident tone of voice, the better to scare us into following their program. But playing upon our fears for ourselves in this way is a bit cynical, given that environmentalists believe we are the ones who in the normal course of our lives are supposedly causing this environmental destruction. It would be either illogical or insincere for them to suggest that we can achieve both their (transcendent) objective for the environment and humanity’s goals for itself. Environmentalists of every persuasion demand that the human impact on the environment (to use their unfriendly phrase) be reduced to a minimum. Chapter 5 Page 16
Consider what this means solely in terms of human population. If it means returning to pre-agricultural levels of human population, this requires reduction of our numbers by something like a thousand-fold (it is typically estimated that there were no more than 5 million people at the end of the last ice-age, whereas there are currently some 6 billion of us). If we instead begin with the premise that we are to be allowed the current sort of lifestyle enjoyed in the industrialized world, then the carrying capacity of the environment, the level of population it can sustain consistent with its mere survival, is “one or two billion, according to most estimates” (Eldredge 1998, p. 184) – and so 25 billions of us must somehow be eliminated for the good of the environment. Minimizing our impact, therefore, would obviously demand reducing population to a mere fraction of the maximum carrying capacity – to, say, a hundred million or 10 million? All of the great cities of the world would have to disappear: Mexico City, New York, Rio de Janeiro, Paris, Peking, Tokyo, London, Toronto, Hong Kong, Singapore, Rome, Cairo,.... What would happen to rich culture these cities support, their art, their architecture, their dance, theatre, festivals, sporting events, food? These, too, would have to disappear, or be reduced to some vestigial form. Science and technology have depended on large populations from which to draw their expert personnel and on using the large resources such populations provide in order to advance our exploration of the universe. This too, would have to stop. The remaining population would be little more than curators of past riches, tending huge bodies of art, history, literature, music, and science, without the people and resources to comprehend it, let alone keep it alive and developing. This is what environmentalists require. Is this what we really want? I will not pretend that the question, which really concerns the future of the whole human species, has an easy answer. I propose instead to return to it in Chapter 11, once both the factual and evaluative parameters governing the choice have been discussed. One crucial fact is that human birth rates continue to fall faster than expected, and the peak population estimates have been pared back from 15 billion in 2075 to 11 billion in 2050. surely all parties to the debate must see this as good news – even environmentalists! However, from their point of view, this news, though good, is not good enough. According to them, the current human population of 6 billion already constitutes a horrendous crime against the environment. The inevitable growth of our population in this, the 21st century, only exacerbates this crime. “Crime” is far too weak a word, from the environmentalist point of view. Our population is a massacre of the environment, an outrage, an environmental holocaust. It is simply out of the question to ask, moreover, that all the people of this century have access to food, shelter, clothing, education, computers, transportation, recreation, medical treatment, etc., at a level that
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Joel E. Cohen, head of the Laboratory of Populations at The Rockefeller University, whose study (1995a, see also 1995b) of the Earth's carrying capacity is considered most authoritative, comes to a quite different conclusion: “The fact is that no single number exists to answer `how many people can the earth support?' because human carrying capacity is dynamic and uncertain. The capacity depends on natural constraints and human choices, which are not captured by the ecological notions of carrying capacity we use for nonhumans. Instead, we must consider in our calculations the interactions of such constraints as food, water and livable land and choices about economies, environment, values and politics” News Release, The Rockefeller University, November 14, 2003, http://www.rockefeller.edu/pubinfo/jecAAAS.nr.html
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the average European or North American now enjoys. As we have seen, at most only a fraction of us could ever do this without totally destroying the environment – if environmentalists are to be believed. We are the enemy, according to environmentalism. Considering the health of the 26 environment alone, it would be better if some plague or famine wiped most of us out. Remember, we are an out-of-control malignancy, from that point of view. When the environmentalist tries to enlist us in the war to save the planet for our children, we have to ask, “Whose children?” There’s not room for them all. Most of them have to be eliminated or marginalized to subsistence levels. If environmentalists were forthright in their call to battle, they would proclaim that these children are the enemy. If you fear for yourself and your children, what should you fear most? Environmental collapse? Or the environmentalist? On the brighter side, the environmentalist’s assessment of the state of the environment is premised upon exaggeration of every bad sign, teamed up with the assumption that every change in the environment caused by human beings amounts to environmental damage, aided and abetted by the resolution to ignore good signs altogether. We have already touched on this when we assessed their apocalyptic vision in Chapter 2. Let’s consider it again from another angle. Environmentalists often frighten us with the idea that we are slowly poisoning ourselves. It goes without saying that they are just as worried about the health of the birds and the bees and the deep blue sea as they are about our health, but the underlying message is the same: pollution is dangerous and it has got to stop. Often this warning is underlined with the threat of complete environmental collapse, with the specter of barren fields, empty seas, poisonous air.
Case 6: Toxic Pollution Here is a threat that is immediate, and unlike anthropogenic global warming, safer from the vicissitudes of changing theory. When it comes to global warming, no respectable environmentalist has gone so far as to argue that the carbon dioxide we release into the atmosphere is toxic, for the simple reason that carbon dioxide is an essential part of our metabolism; it literally runs through our veins, and its concentration in our lungs is greater than that of the external atmosphere by orders of magnitude. On the other hand, environmentalists do think of carbon dioxide as a pollutant, in the sense
David Foreman, founding member of the environmentalist group Earth First! (a name which expresses succinctly environmentalism’s transcendent value), has been unusually forthcoming in expressing what this value entails. This has led to his notoriety, and the admission among some environmentalists that he went too far. Foreman is on record as saying, “Humanity is the cancer of nature.... The optimum human population of Earth is zero,” Sarasota Herald-Tribune, Jan. 17, 1998. Note that the first part is the usual view among environmentalists (see quote from Suzuki, above). The second part, which got so much attention, follows from the first – Foreman merely was forthright enough to draw the obvious conclusion. Foreman also said (1991, p. 26), “Human suffering resulting from drought and famine in Ethiopia is tragic, yes, but the destruction there of other creatures and habitat is even more tragic.” Note that Ethiopians do not use modern agricultural methods, nor are they highly industrialized – even so, their form of life, though closer to nature than our own, is still deemed an environmental crime.
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of something that makes the atmosphere impure. In view of the arguments we have just considered, that is a claim that deserves critical scrutiny – but that is not the issue here. The point here is simply to focus on a more specific topic: toxic pollution. A pollutant, in this sense, is something released into the environment in such a way that it poses a real risk of poisoning somebody or something, whether animals or plants.27 The advantage of defining pollution in this way is that it designates something undeniably real. There was a time, climaxing in the middle of the last century, when thousands would sicken, and hundreds die, in a single London fog. In those days coal was used for heating and electrical generation in the city. During temperature inversions, when there was little atmospheric circulation, the air became laden with oxides of sulfur, carbon, and nitrogen. London was not the only city that had a problem with air pollution, nor was pollution limited to the air. Most urban areas suffered from pollution of air, water, and soil, with this taint spreading outwards into the surrounding countryside. I propose, first, that there is simply no denying the fact that pollution was a very real, and very serious threat to the health of all living things. I suggest, secondly, that we have to accept that it remains a real problem, one that must be addressed with resolve and energy. Third – and this, I have found, is a point that many environmentalists don’t want to accept – pollution is on the decline. Finally, I think we should thank environmentalists for their tireless work in making people realize the danger of pollution, and making them confront that danger. Thank you, environmentalists, for your crucial contributions to this great achievement! Our very gratitude itself implies that we have made some progress, that we have turned a key corner when it comes to addressing the problem of pollution. Perusing the many databases containing statistics on pollution bears this out – enormous progress has been made: see the figure entitled, “Some Pollution Statistics,” on the next page. Unfortunately, many environmentalists may be inclined to reject our gratitude in favor of stoking our fears. Admittedly, fear has been a useful tool in getting us to realize the dangers of pollution – but the time has come for more sober, more philosophical, environmental thinking. General fear of pollution was quite justified in the days of the killer fogs in London. And fear for ourselves remains a power motivator, one that environmentalists may wish to retain as a tool. But environmental philosophy demands that we neither exaggerate nor minimize danger, but rather seek the literal truth. When we do so, we will find that our gratitude to the environmentalists is justified after all. Things have gotten better, thank you very much. I am not, by any means, suggesting that the problem of pollution has been solved. Certain toxins still pose especially difficult problems, such as nitrogen oxides28 and
It should go without saying that poisoning need not result in death, but merely in some reduction of health, whether immediate or delayed. 28 Nitrogen is the main component (78%) of air, and when air is used as the source of oxygen in combustion (oxygen being the other major component of air, at 21%), the high temperature causes the formation of nitrogen oxides. These give urban smog its characteristic brownish color. The toxic effect occurs when nitrogen oxides combine with water (as in the lungs, or on the surfaces of plants) to form acids. Since they are produced by the heat of combustion, they would not be eliminated even by replacement of fossil fuels with hydrogen. On the other hand, they could conceivably be eliminated by using pure oxygen as an oxidant for combustion, or using other sources of power than combustion (hydroelectric, nuclear, etc.).
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nuclear wastes29. Progress has been uneven, with the greatest strides being made in the industrialized world, while the rest of the world lags behind. In China and those countries formerly within the USSR, political and social forces pushed the problem of pollution under the rug even as they industrialized, resulting in the worst cases of pollution. Only recently has it emerged as a serious issue, with political leaders addressing it as such, and ordinary citizens calling en masse for action. Among the developing nations, the situation is not as bad, but progress has been much slower than among their more prosperous neighbors. They are at a stage like that of the generation that lived through the toxic fogs in London and other cities. Like those nations that have since then made the most progress, they have come to realize that pollution is a real problem, a deadly serious problem. Their leaders now routinely address pollution as a recognized political issue. Progress is demanded by ordinary citizens as well as by other nations (often under cover of trading regulations).30 Most importantly, real progress is being made. But, in all nations of the world, pollution remains a problem. I am not suggesting this problem is solved. Instead, I am suggesting that the crisis is past. Just as a carpenter is not going to build the best house if the work is done under the threat of fastapproaching winter, so too environmental policy is going to be hasty, ill-conceived, and makeshift if it is born in a climate of fear. Instead, we should calmly build on the successes of the past. Our progress in dealing with pollution should serve as the foundation for further work. I know from personal experience that many environmentalists find it very difficult to admit that any progress has been made. I suggest that this view simply does not bear logical scrutiny. Pollution indices have been steadily going down over the last three decades. Is this just the result of a massive cover-up involving government, science, and industry? Wouldn’t some politician have made a career out of blowing the cover off of it by now? Thousands upon thousands of scientists are involved in pollution studies, the vast majority with no incentive whatever to cover anything up. Many scientists have deep and sincere concern for the environment, and quickly publish any data showing an increase in pollution. Even so, the overall trend of pollution is strongly downwards. Research like that reported in the reduction of DDE and PCBs in the eggs of wild cormorants (and there are many more like it) is especially significant, since it shows that even persistent toxins are gradually being eliminated, and that wildlife is benefiting, which in turn implies that we, too, are safer. Such a longitudinal study, involving many scientists over many years, would be extremely hard to counterfeit. And it is only one of hundreds of similar studies.
It is becoming increasingly likely that we should not expect a “final solution” of the problem of nuclear wastes to be found soon. Sequestering them until they are no longer toxic requires safe storage for tens of thousands of years, a temporal scale that has staggered our engineers. This means that we should be researching better interim solutions: methods of safe storage that will tide us over for a few centuries, until better methods of disposal, perhaps even of elimination, of these dangerous substances can be found. 30 No one wants to import food that may be poisoned with industrial or agricultural chemicals. Nor do trading nations want to give some countries the (dubious, short-term) economic advantage of not meeting pollution standards, and so resist imports from countries where standards are not met. Tourists and business travelers refuse to go to polluted areas. These and similar economic forces have a large positive effect, reinforcing local demands for pollution reduction.
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Are we to seriously believe that thousands of scientists, spanning over a generation, have conspired to cover up grave dangers to the health of their own families and friends? I suggest that the answer is no. In the end, we determine reality and truth by the mutual support of numberless pieces of information and countless personal experiences. As we have seen, the notion that there is no good news about the environment simply will not fit with the information and experience available to all of us. Here are a few more reasons to accept that there is good news in the battle against pollution – and then we must move on to other issues. Ë We are often told that industry is implacably opposed to any environmental programs since they cut into profits, that science (which gets over 90% of its funding from industrial sponsors) must follow suit, and that government cannot stand up against this coalition of interests, therefore preventing progress in the battle against pollution. ♦ The production of ozone-depleting CFCs has been phased out via the Montreal Protocol (1987). This was achieved by extensive consultation and cooperation among government, science, and industry. Unless we assume that the success of the protocol is illusory, we are forced to conclude that these key groups can have a shared interest in working for the good of the environment. Ë Over the last five decades the massive loss of forests due to acid rain has continually been predicted. ♦ The amount of forested land in the U.S. has remained steady since 1920, even as its population, agricultural production, and industrial production all increased dramatically (USDA 2000, p. 2). Only small losses of forest to acid rain have ever been documented. Unless we assume that acid rain is not a serious threat to forests, we are forced to conclude that the reductions in acid rain reported in statistical measures are indeed real. Ë We have often been warned that ongoing pollution threatens us with the collapse of agriculture. ♦ A few generations ago chronic malnutrition afflicted more than half of the world’s population, whereas only a tiny proportion of humanity now face this problem, even though population has more than doubled during the same period. The reason: agricultural production has grown even faster. Unless we assume that pollution is not a serious threat to agriculture, we are forced to conclude that pollution has indeed been decreasing. Ë We have often heard dire predictions that toxic substances building up in the environment, in the air we breath, the water we drink, and the food we eat, would result in an epidemic of disease and death. ♦ The average lifespan continues to grow, especially in the most industrialized countries. Unless we assume that pollution is not a serious threat to our health, we are forced to conclude that pollution has indeed been decreasing. We can all admit that there are environmental problems, very serious problems, but can we not also admit that there has been some good news? A perpetual diet of bad news is not conducive to either good work or to happiness. I am assuming, here, that it is at least permissible to mention our happiness. Many environmentalists are loathe to allow the topic of human happiness, as if doing so would legitimize its pursuit, and thereby Chapter 5 Page 21
trivialize the infinitely more important pursuit of environmental goals. Going for a Sunday drive, after all, has been a source of happiness for countless millions over the years, but if saving the planet demands it, we must be ready to sacrifice the Sunday drive. And so, in this and in countless other ways, we are urged to put our own happiness last, in order to devote ourselves to environmental goals. But, think of this: if there is nothing wrong with playing on our fears, with urging us to act to avoid our own unhappiness, then it follows as a matter of logic that our happiness has already entered the debate. Since it has entered the debate, it should do so honestly and completely, and it is neither honest nor complete to play on our fears while ignoring the possibilities for success and rejoicing. A sound environmental philosophy demands that we accept the good news along with the bad. There is, as a side-benefit, no better encouragement than success. Success, as it has so often been observed, breeds success. And so there is nothing wrong with accepting the good news – and being happy about it. Lesson 5: Don't let yourself be frightened! The human race has never been safer. The real danger is that we will be spooked into unfortunate action.
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