Let's state the principle here, the most famous instantiation of
which
is Principle 15 of the Rio Earth Summit:

"in order to protect the environment, the precautionary approach
shall
be widely applied by States according to their capability. Where
there
are threats of serious or irreversible damage, lack of full
scientific
certainty shall not be used as a reason for postponing cost-effective
measures to prevent environmental degradation".



While appealing in its simplicity, there are three major problems with the
precautionary principle.

First,


none of us live our lives according to the precautionary principle.



And here's the first problem with objections to the principle.

1. Most people do attempt to live their lives according to some
version of the precautionary principle.


We don't know for example, that cigarette smoking causes lung cancer.
We can't be sure if we start smoking that we will suffer anything
more
than the cost of the cigarettes. And if we are smokers we can't be
sure that stopping will make a difference. But even smokers typically
acknowledge the need to quit and frequently make efforts to do so.
Most of us try to discourage children and pregnant women from smoking
and encourage our friends to quit. Why? Because the risks are simply
not worth taking. There's a scientific consensus that we ought not to
and even if the precise mechanisms for illness are unknown, we know
enough to know it isn't good.


We do the same with drugs, and drinking alcohol above certain norms,
and driving cars too fast or going through traffic control signals or
street racing. We can't say for sure whether any instance of these
things will prove injurious but we think the odds look poor enough to
recommened people don't do it.


People take out insurance, and lock their cars and their homes. If
your went on an ocean cruise and their were no life boats or life
jackets aboard most would object. If some airline's planes start
making the news with accidents people start looking elsewhere even
though the odds are still on their side. People don't like their kids
walking home alone in the dark even though their chances of being a
crime victim are poor.


The precautionary principle rules, even if people sometimes act
impulsively and forget to honour it.


And in the case of smoking, you get an immediate advantage -- it
costs
less and you don't poisopn your lungs with tar. So too with climate
change, you don't have to accept the AGW hypothesis to know that not
squandering scarce resources poisoning the air and the water and
building unleveable cities makes sense and will save you money.



Let me give you an example. Around the world about 1.2 million people die each year in car
accidents - about 3,200 deaths a day. At that pace, 120 million people will die this
century in a car wreck somewhere in the world. We could save 120 million lives
by imposing
a 5 MPH speed limit worldwide.


Not only that but we could cut down masses of brain injuries and
other
life-altering trauma and the drains on families -- especially in the
third world where the health system can't cope.

But this is a strawman. We don't have to cut speed limits to 5 MPH to
do this. This is why you didn't quote the actual principle above. the
relevant portion is:


"shall not be used as a reason for postponing cost-effective
measures"


Slowing traffic to 5MPH would not be cost-effective because nobody
would honour it without a massively expensive police state appratus
over the entire planet. In much of the world the compliance systems
couldn't cope and in much of the world bribery determines who gets
the
right to drive. A far better and per capita cheaper measure would be
making the need to drive redundant as often as possible.



Show of hands: how many would be willing to live with a 5 MPH speed limit to \
save 120 million lives? Most of us won't - we accept trade-offs.


This is how a strawman works. Come up with an absurd proposition and
see how many think it absurd.


We implicitly do a cost-benefit analysis and conclude that we're not going to do
without our cars, even if doing so would save 120 million lives.


And now the blogger abandons his last strawman in favour of another
and starts talking about abandoning "our cars" rather than slowing
them to 5 MPH. This fellow is shameless.


So before we start down this expensive and likely futile cap and trade path, don't you think we should insist on an honest analysis of alternative responses to
global warming?


Begs the question: Has an honest analysis been done? Without saying
so, he implies it hasn't but in fact there has been quiter a bit of
analysis. Even here in Australia we have examined carbon taxes and
cap
and trade. But this dishonest blogger wants to smuggle the idea that
we've never thought of it in bags strapped to his legs and shoved up
his colon.

Custom demands a body search!



Second,

the media dwells on the potential harm from global warming, but ignores the fact that the
costs borne to address it will also do harm.



No they won't ... let's see where he goes with this though ...


We have a finite amount of wealth in the world.


Oh ... I see. Wealth is "finite" but oil is infinite. Got it. This
chap is not even pretending he's not touting for the polluters lobby.


We have a long list of problems - hunger, poverty, malaria, nuclear proliferation,
HIV, just to name a few. Your generation should ask: how can we do the most
good with our limited wealth?


Pretty obviously, avoiding handing it over to the people who own coal
and oil and who dump the waste for free into the biosphere poisoning
every living thing and truncating the life prospects of people not
yet
borne would be a good start. People are finite and if they are dead,
the wealth they produce definitely goes down.


The opportunity cost of
diverting a large part of current wealth to solve a potential problem 50-100 years
from now means we do "less good" dealing with our current problems.


False dilemma fallacy and again begs a couple of questions:

1. Will a large part of the current wealth be 'diverted'? (if so,
where? -- surely somebody has to get it and if and when they do, do
they have any choice but to pass it on? They can't just stick it in
their sockdrawer!)


Again, the dishonest blogger is trying to make an argument without
arguing it.


2. Will the 'opportunity cost' of these funds be "not dealing with
malaria, HIV, poverty, hunger, nuclear prolifetion"?


The dishonest blogger implies it but what is the connection? Many of
the actions associated with mitigation involve transfer payments from
the first world to the third world. Payment for protecting forests
for
example, or cutting down their use of fossil fuels. In the very place
where this dishonest blogger posts, polluters' shills regularly
complain that AGW is all a backdoor way of enriching the developing
world at the expense of the first world. Clearly they can't have it
both ways.


The fact of the matter is that if we assist the developing world to
build sustainable cities, improve agricultural infrastructure and
housing and so forth, not only will they emit less -- they will
suffer
less from the diseases of poverty including malaria and AIDS. It's a
hell of a lot easier to live well when you aren't running a huge
trade
deficit in oil.



Third,

economists will tell you that the consequence of a cap and trade tax on energy
will be slower economic growth.



The economists are divided on this. It may well be that this simply
subverts the price of fossil fuels.

What it will do will be to spur the redirection of funds to less
carbon-intensive activities. This should massively underpin the
building of new more sustainable infrastructure which will lay the
basis for future prosperity.



Slower growth, compounded over decades, means that we leave future
generations with less
wealth to deal with the consequences of global warming, whatever they may be.


The figures I've seen are utterly trivial -- 1-2% of GDP over 30-40
years -- and what is more, they don't factor in the positives. If
people are healthier because the air is cleaner then they are likely
to be more productive and funds in the health and welfare system can
be redirected to deal with other problems.

Since few if any of these economists foresaw the GFC meltdown you do
have to wonder about their ability to calculate compound growth over
the next 40-90 years.


What a pack of losers the GPC spruikers are.


Fran

On May 18, 4:29*pm, Fran wrote:
Let's state the principle here, the most famous instantiation of
which
is Principle 15 of the Rio Earth Summit:

"in order to protect the environment, the precautionary approach
shall
be widely applied by States according to their capability. Where
there
are threats of serious or irreversible damage, lack of full
scientific
certainty shall not be used as a reason for postponing cost-effective
measures to prevent environmental degradation".

While appealing in its simplicity, there are three major problems with the
precautionary principle.
First,
none of us live our lives according to the precautionary principle.

And here's the first problem with objections to the principle.

1. Most people do attempt to live their lives according to some
version of the precautionary principle.

We don't know for example, that cigarette smoking causes lung cancer.
We can't be sure if we start smoking that we will suffer anything
more
than the cost of the cigarettes. And if we are smokers we can't be
sure that stopping will make a difference. But even smokers typically
acknowledge the need to quit and frequently make efforts to do so.
Most of us try to discourage children and pregnant women from smoking
and encourage our friends to quit. Why? Because the risks are simply
not worth taking. There's a scientific consensus that we ought not to
and even if the precise mechanisms for illness are unknown, we know
enough to know it isn't good.

We do the same with drugs, and drinking alcohol above certain norms,
and driving cars too fast or going through traffic control signals or
street racing. We can't say for sure whether any instance of these
things will prove injurious but we think the odds look poor enough to
recommened people don't do it.

People take out insurance, and lock their cars and their homes. If
your went on an ocean cruise and their were no life boats or life
jackets aboard most would object. If some airline's planes start
making the news with accidents people start looking elsewhere even
though the odds are still on their side. People don't like their kids
walking home alone in the dark even though their chances of being a
crime victim are poor.

The precautionary principle rules, even if people sometimes act
impulsively and forget to honour it.

And in the case of smoking, you get an immediate advantage -- it
costs
less and you don't poisopn your lungs with tar. So too with climate
change, you don't have to accept the AGW hypothesis to know that not
squandering scarce resources poisoning the air and the water and
building unleveable cities makes sense and will save you money.

Let me give you an example. Around the world about 1.2 million people die each year in car
accidents - about 3,200 deaths a day. At that pace, 120 million people will die this
century in a car wreck somewhere in the world. We could save 120 million lives
by imposing
a 5 MPH speed limit worldwide.

Not only that but we could cut down masses of brain injuries and
other
life-altering trauma and the drains on families -- especially in the
third world where the health system can't cope.

But this is a strawman. We don't have to cut speed limits to 5 MPH to
do this. This is why you didn't quote the actual principle above. the
relevant portion is:

"shall not be used as a reason for postponing cost-effective
measures"

Slowing traffic to 5MPH would not be cost-effective because nobody
would honour it without a massively expensive police state appratus
over the entire planet. In much of the world the compliance systems
couldn't cope and in much of the world bribery determines who gets
the
right to drive. A far better and per capita cheaper measure would be
making the need to drive redundant as often as possible.

Show of hands: how many would be willing to live with a 5 MPH speed limit to \
save 120 million lives? Most of us won't - we accept trade-offs.

This is how a strawman works. Come up with an absurd proposition and
see how many think it absurd.

We implicitly do a cost-benefit analysis and conclude that we're not going to do
without our cars, even if doing so would save 120 million lives.

And now the blogger abandons his last strawman in favour of another
and starts talking about abandoning "our cars" rather than slowing
them to 5 MPH. This fellow is shameless.

So before we start down this expensive and likely futile cap and trade path, don't you think we should insist on an honest analysis of alternative responses to
global warming?

Begs the question: Has an honest analysis been done? Without saying
so, he implies it hasn't but in fact there has been quiter a bit of
analysis. Even here in Australia we have examined carbon taxes and
cap
and trade. But this dishonest blogger wants to smuggle the idea that
we've never thought of it in bags strapped to his legs and shoved up
his colon.

Custom demands a body search!

Second,
the media dwells on the potential harm from global warming, but ignores the fact that the
costs borne to address it will also do harm.

No they won't ... let's see where he goes with this though ...

We have a finite amount of wealth in the world.

Oh ... I see. Wealth is "finite" but oil is infinite. Got it. This
chap is not even pretending he's not touting for the polluters lobby.


snip

And as it turns out, though I didn't know it when I wrote this, the
writer was indeed an explicit member of the GPC. Even his name is
appropriate.

Energy Myths and Realities
Keith O. Rattie
Chairman, President and CEO
Questar Corporation
Utah Valley University
April 2, 2009


The company sells natural gas ...


Fran