By John Ransom
Wednesday, September 18, 2013
Two things have happened with the climate debate recently
that reveals that climate change apologists—better known as Europeans-- owe the
rest of us an apology.
OK, make that three things have happened.
Or to put it more correctly: two things have happened and
one thing has not.
What hasn’t happened, as most of us know by now, is that
temperatures have not risen in the last two decades.
This pause in “global warming” has confounded the models
that climate change evangelists cite when they propose to tax the rest of us,
ration our energy and herd us into urban areas where we all get to ride bikes,
buses and electric train cars “for our own good.”
Montana, for example, is not oceanfront property as of
yet, and, the last time I looked, rising oceans have swamped no substantial
islands.
This non-event has led to a bit of nervous laughter from
the Left.
In a pre-release of the upcoming IPCC climate change
report, UN scientists reportedly concede that their models have failed to
account for this almost two decade long pause of global warming.
“One of the central issues [dealt with in the new report]
is believed to be why the IPCC failed to account for the ‘pause’ in global
warming,” writes the UK’s Telegraph, “which they admit that they did not
predict in their computer models. Since 1997, world average temperatures have
not shown any statistically significant increase.
The summary also shows that scientist have now discovered
that between 950 and 1250 AD, before the Industrial Revolution, parts of the
world were as warm for decades at a time as they are now.”
But still a group of scientists, who have more time on
their hands than is wise, and also more money than common sense, happened to
put out a new “world” map that will help us with spending more money on things
scientists now admit that they don’t know about. This map is based on the
climate change model we know to be flawed.
The map purports to show the world areas most susceptible
to climate change; areas that will be vulnerable, of course, in some distant
future when the flawed climate model suddenly, miraculously, imitates reality,
likely by Divine intervention or just plain old coincidence.
“Scientists said that the new world map,” writes IBTimes,
“which is created using data from the world’s ecosystems and predictions of how
climate change will impact them, is expected to help governments, environmental
agencies and donors identify regions that would be best served by investments
in programs such as the creation of protected areas, restoration efforts and
other conservation activities.”
Yup, um, scientists are always saying stuff like that
with other people’s money: proposing tax credits and restoration work and
off-limit areas where really, really important stuff is happening in nature.
Or perhaps not.
See, I used to think that the point of science was to
actually figure out how the world really works, not how we would like it to
work.
But I can see now that it’s more important to have
scientific models of how the world should work.
Because just this week, the European Commissioner of
Climate Change Action—a sort of European Power Ranger on climate—happened to
say: so what if we got the science regarding the earth’s temperature wrong?
Can’t we just be grateful to the climate model without being nitpicky on actual
temperature or consequences?
"Let's say that science,” said EU weather czar
Connie Hedegaard, “some decades from now, said 'we were wrong, it was not about
climate', would it not in any case have been good to do many of things you have
to do in order to combat climate change?"
What? Like riding bikes more? Drinking one glass of red
wine a day? Shipping more Powder River Basin coal to China so that the Chinese
can enjoy the benefits of the cheap, domestic U.S. coal reserves while
Americans pay more for energy?
In fairness to science, Hedegaard, isn’t really a
scientist. She’s more of a literary historian. Her Wikipedia entry describes
her as a “public intellectual,” whatever that is.
And her defective thinking exemplifies why I’ve always
been troubled by liberals’ obsession with Europe.
Talk about making bad, bad decisions as a continent.
Here’s a region of supposedly educated and superior
people-- Europe that is-- who have made very few correct decisions over the
last 200 years.
And after hearing from Hedegaard, I don’t think those bad
decisions are chance. It’s ingrained poor processing, it’s public
intellectualism.
There was that whole Hitler thing; before that the World
War I thing; Napoleon, Stalin, monarchies, socialism, communism, green parties,
not shaving your underarms. Horsemeat is considered a delicacy in Europe!
And another thing: Europe controlled North America for
longer than there has been the United States.
In all that time they couldn’t make it profitable.
Why?
The taxes were too high. Everyone besides Obama and the
Europeans know this.
So on behalf of the rest of the country, even the rest of
the world, I accept your apology Europe for getting so much of history wrong.
Now let’s talk about that science thing…
No comments:
Post a Comment