- Two problems I see with relying on the free market to reduce our dependence on oil:
1. The market is reactive rather than proactive. So the damage must first be felt before a correction occurs.
Look at the last ten years, with oil prices rising sharply since 1998 yet oil demand also continued to rise.
We have not felt the pain, and therefore the market has not reacted. Yet basic mathematics show that increasing demand and dwindling supply will lead to problems.
My main point is that it is far cheaper to make changes in a controlled manner now, rather than to wait until problems occur and we must change in a hurry using available technology whilst also throwing money to fix all the other problems. Especially with oil, which will affect everything from industry to the price of vegetables.
2. The price signals are broken (which is what I meant by “we keep propping it up”), thanks to things like subsidies and taxation around the world.
Furthermore, the cost of fuel is small compared to the total cost of, say, a car (including maintenance, registration, insurance), and the earning potential (or convenience) of using the car. This means that demand will continue to grow while oil prices continue to rise, until the cost of fuel becomes a significant part of using a car.
It gets even more complicated if you consider that the other costs in having a car might also be indirectly influenced by oil prices, almost to the point where the cost of fuel will never outweigh the other costs.

Note that I believe we should reduce our reliance on all oil, not just on “foreign oil”.

To bring things back on topic, I believe that just looking at the “cost of the fight” is inadequate, since fighting AGW has other benefits, just as did the “race to the moon” and the “Manhattan project”, which I guess is what’s behind the name of Greg Craven’s site “The Manpollo Project”. Heehee! Mr. Craven at least deserves kudos for coming up with that!

-”Sleight of hand” and “holocaust deniers?” The two aren’t even comparable. One is frustrating and the other is the other is outright disgusting. Like I said, it is inexcusable.

-Fight global warming just to reduce our dependence on foreign oil? That reason is much worse than to fight global warming to “save the planet” from a perceived risk. Soon enough, we won’t have to rely on foreign oil. Not because we are “fighting global warming,” but because that is the way technology and a free market works. It gets better.

In fairness and in the spirit of helpful debate, I think that the Climate Skeptic should respond to Greg Craven’s videos in their entirety. He has presented his counter-arguments. Now it’s the Skeptic’s move.

I believe it is likely that we will see that there are flawed arguments on both sides, because we are talking about the unknown future. We simply do not know who will be right and who will be wrong, or if it’ll be something in-between. Perhaps the catastrophizers have overestimated the impact. But equally, perhaps the Skeptic has overestimated the effects of throwing money at fighting Global Warming. Who knows, it could be that research into alternative fuel sources may have spinoff’s that have a positive effect on the economy, or that this Natural Capitalism idea actually saves money and improves productivity.

To be honest, I am wavering here. I don’t know that we’re on the brink of any major catastrophe, however I am concerned that if the global demand continues to grow, we’re likely to run out of oil, water, and food (there is only so much CH and O in the world). So we either start shifting our dependence away from oil now, in a controlled manner, or we keep propping it up until we are forced to change in a big hurry. So perhaps we really should fight Global Warming, but in order to reduce our reliance on oil rather than for the reasons that Greg Craven gives.

In answer to Andrew Heilborn’s post above, I think that these are the statements referred to:
- From the AAAS, who are responsible for the Science magazine: http://www.aaas.org/news/releases/2007/0218am_statement.shtml
- From the NAS: http://www7.nationalacademies.org/ocga/testimony/Global_Climate_Change_Policy_and_Budget_Review.asp

I found your videos quite interesting. However, I found your most recent response inexcusable. What exactly was your point in responding to this blog in such a manner? Did you feel it would add anything to the content of your videos? Your ideas may have been attacked, your name may have been soiled, but do these arguments range much beyond the walls of this blog? Hardly. Any respect I may have had for you has been lost because of the manner in which you responded. Holocaust deniers? Your videos appealed to the masses because of the logic, rather than science, of your particular argument, and by denouncing your opponents with terms like “holocaust denier” you begin to lose that logical appeal–if your conclusion was really undeniable, why name call? Not only do you not gain any credibility with those that disagree with you, but you lose credibility with those that may have agreed with you.

You may say you are fighting for a decent future for your daughters, but I doubt your daughters would ever excuse such insults used under the guise of “their name.” And I doubt you would raise them to use such language. It would appear that you are fighting for reasons other than your daughters’ future.

I swung back by here to see if you had actually followed up with my refutations above (posted Dec 17, 2007) of your critiques of my video “How It All Ends,” contained in the 44 videos following up that project.

I see that you haven’t.

Yet you continue to pound the drum of economic alarmism and use scare tactics about totalitarian governments whenever someone mentions a solution which might impinge on a completely unfettered market. You might understand my frustration when you so firmly fit into the errors of thought that I outlined in my follow-up videos (especially “Nature of Science,” “Risk Management,” “Get What You Want,” and “No Holds Barred”) with your well-established hostility toward government, and your lack of a reasonable test of falsifiability for your claim that AGW is not sufficient to merit significant action. You criticize others for using simple college debate tactics (http://www.coyoteblog.com/coyote_blog/2007/07/global-warming-.html), yet you yourself engage in the very effective and totally disrespected tactic of “spreading” your opponents, where you nitpick enough to give the sense to onlookers that you’ve given a thorough refutation, without actually providing robust refutation of the key points.

I tried playing nice, but your insistence on betting the world (OUR world, I might add) on your own personal assessment of climate science–while detracting from anyone who questions YOUR assessment of economics–your supreme confidance that you are correct, and therefore need not even consider the question “what if you’re wrong,” is so irresponsible and reckless that it defies civility.

You refuse to investigate the answers to your objections, and you move one, continuing to re-assert your claims. If Rush Limbaugh is your hero, then you must be pretty pleased with your mimicry, and enjoying the adulation of those who come to your blog to feel good in having their beliefs affirmed. If, however, you still have within you enough charity to allow the benefits of others to enter into your metric of what to do or say, then I deeply hope you will view the arguments in my videos, consider them thoughtfully with the attitude that you might just possibly have something to learn–that perhaps you aren’t perfect yet–and take up the challenge contained in them to either let your thinking be informed, or explain why it hasn’t been. It is to that part of you–that part which is still interested in humbly seeking better understanding rather than merely the preservation of dearly-held opinions which feel good and righteous–that I appeal to.

I hope that is still within you. But given what I’ve seen of your postings, I think it probably is not. I would love to be proven wrong. To end up with egg on my face. For it to be shown to the world that I was overly excitable in my evaluation, and my “calling out” of you.

Reading your blog and the comments of your admirers reminds me of a virtual compound of survivalists or cult members, holed up with like-minded compatriots, reinforcing each other’s faith, holding the “hostile” and “irrational” world at bay. So out of touch with the rest of the world that overwhelming disagreement with the rest of society is taken as yet more evidence of persecution of the just and righteous, rather than an indication that perhaps you would be best served by a re-examination of your beliefs.

I wish you could step out of that, and see that—to most of the rest of us—you are starting to resemble moon hoaxers, or Holocaust deniers, who always have their evidence and experts to provide enough fodder them to satisfy their conscience that their beliefs are not faith-based, or biased, or blinded. This is why I spent well over an hour in my videos talking about how one of the hallmarks of the scientific mindset—and probably the single greatest source of its success–is to be ever vigilant for your own biases. To be humble.

I almost always manage to avoid engaging in acrimony. But you’ve brought out the worst in me. Your reckless disregard for the benefit of others punches my “Papa Bear” button, because the whole reason I’m doing this is that I’m fighting for a decent future for my two beautiful daughters.

I dearly hope to be proven wrong.

Most Sincerely,
Greg Craven (wonderingmind42, the creator of “The Most Terrifying Video You’ll Ever See” and the entire six hours of the “How It All Ends” video project)

I’m not trying to be sarcastic, I’m trying to figure out whether you consider air pollution a benefit or not — since, as best I can tell, most of your criticisms assume there is no cost to air pollution short of total global catastrophe.”

You do realize we’re talking about CO2 here, right? Carbon Dioxide. This is not like Sulfuric Acid or Chloroflorocarbons. This is not some exotic synthetic ‘OMG it’ll kill us all chemical’ that only muscle-cars and plastic-wrap release. This is a natural byproduct of the synthisis of energy wether it be from coal burning in a power-plant to gasoline being exploded in a car’s engine to food that’s digesting in your stomache Right Now.

Nobody is advocating dumping ‘Garbage’ into the air, because CO2 is not ‘Garbage’, it’s a natural part of our environment and it’s status as a pollutant-gas is entirely dependent upon it’s classification as a greenhouse gas. If it turns out man-made CO2 emissions don’t have a significant impact on global climate destabilization then That’s It. It won’t cause Acid Rain, it won’t eat-away the Ozone Layer, it won’t cause your children to be born with Down’s Syndrome and steps taken to control CO2 emissions are not guaranteed to also control the chemicals that Can lead to all of the above as a happy side-benefit.