Another week gone and what does that mean? A weekend of some good reads. Here are my picks for this weekend. Hope you enjoy them as much as I did.
- Seduced and Abandoned: The lurid details of how Rupert Murdoch’s 14-year marriage with Wendy Dang unraveled. Vanity Fair really knows how to dig for dirt.
- How Suzanne Vega took control of her music: She shares her secrets with Music Week in this amazing interview. I loved reading it.
- The philosophical anthropology of 1 percent: A humble rant turned into an intellectual argument by William Davies, author of forthcoming book, The Limits of Neoliberalism.
- Facebook’s plan to conquer the world with crappy phones and bad networks: This Mat Honan special is worth reading.
- Silicon Valley’s Circus of innovation: Writing for Aeon magazine, Venkatesh Rao argues for the boom-bust-bubble approach of Silicon Valley.
- An inconvenient billionaire: Tom Steyer is using his billions to get in the face of climate change deniers. Good for him.
- South Sudan is fighting itself again: Some things don’t change, old enmities among them.
First, I generally like Gigaom. If I could redo the survey I took last week, I would put, “Don’t put your personal opinions about man-made global warming on Gigaom.” It doesn’t seem to serve any purpose other than boosting your ego.
Next, I would point you to this opinion in the Wall Street Journal. http://on.wsj.com/MChhMC It makes the point that spending $100 million on the global warming issue during the midterms is a terrible use for that money, if Tom Steyer’s goal is to reduce carbon emissions. Global warming frequently ranks last on the list of issues for voters. It makes much more sense to simply donate to politicians that support his cause, who can much more effectively turn that money into votes.
It’s important to note that Tom Steyer’s plan is emblematic of what is wrong with the thinking of those who fear man-made global warming. Instead of asking, “What is the most effective response to my fear?” they seem to ask “What response makes me feel the best about myself?” Anyone who understands human nature and global power structures knew from the get go a unified global reduction in carbon emissions was never going to work. They can keep meeting about it, but even if you believe it is in the interest of everyone on the planet to reduce emissions, it is in the interest of every individual country to ignore that. Any individual country’s emissions makes no tangible difference.
This is why, absent a global agreement, the efforts by those who fear man-made global warming in the US are so silly. Even if the US halved its emissions, it would have no tangible effect on global temperatures. They are asking Americans to accept a lower standard of living with more government control in exchange for absolutely nothing at all. Strangely enough, the move to natural gas that many Greens are so upset about has caused the US to reduce its emissions more than any other developed nation. This even includes the European ones that did pretty much everything the Greens wanted.
Lastly, I’ll leave you with some “inconvenient” thoughts. Every major data set shows no statistically significant warming in the past 15 years, and many are pushing 20. Many new climate models show a median climate sensitivity of 2 degrees Celsius, which is well below the estimates we’ve been told over the past couple decades. This is because the real-world data from the past two decades makes it more and more difficult to produce models with a high climate sensitivity. Back in the 90s and early 2000s, climate scientists basically had a blank canvas upon which to paint whatever picture would lead to the most increase in prestige and funding. Naturally, this meant supporting and enforcing the party line set by the journal editors. Self interest is a powerful force.
Unfortunately, the data that’s been coming in keeps making those scenarios look less and less likely. Even though this change in thinking is well-documented in the literature, for some reason this knowledge has not trickled down to those on the political left. I think this shows that “climate change” has always been more of an ideology than a real scientific concern. I’m hoping more and more people start to think about how they will look in the future, having posted all over the internet their belief in something that will likely look pretty foolish in the coming years. It’s at least something to consider. If you haven’t reevaluated your position on global warming recently, now might be the time.
And you are ????? Maybe before spouting off like a raving lunatic, you could provide a couple pieces of information …
1. Who are you and why should anyone listen to you? Credentials please?
2. Assuming you are not an expert … perhaps you could provide a couple of links to support your arguments that aren’t opinion pieces?
3. Don’t you ad hominem attacks calling people foolish and accuse them of pushing “personal opinions” and then push your personal opinion
Just sayin’