Our backup plan is exactly the same as for any other natural disaster. What is our backup plan for another tsunami? Or an earthquake all along the San Andreas? Or an asteroid strike? Or a new plague pandemic? Or a global thermonuclear war? Or new agricultural diseases causing a global famine? The plan is simple: to develop as much of the prosperity, resources, and technology that we will most likely need to act most effectively when we actually do know we have a real problem. And in the meantime, to devote our efforts to more immediate problems for which the greatest benefits can be obtained for the given costs.

Let me put it another way. The eco-scare back in the 60s was overpopulation – we had books like The Population Bomb and Limits to Growth telling us how we were all DOOMED, how India couldn’t be saved and should be written off to famine, how the famines would be killing millions by the 70s, how it was likely Western civilisation would collapse before the end of the millenium – unless we introduced immediate totalitarian population controls. Compulsory and near compulsory sterilisation. One-child policies. Punitive taxation systems. Sacrifice. Rationing. Industrial regression back to the level of subsistence farming. All the same old crypto-socialist stuff. This was taken seriously enough by governments that they actually made mass sterilisation programmes a condition of humanitarian aid. The US government actually did that. It was the received wisdom in the media and in middle class dinner party conversation – considered to be obvious and beyond debate. Prominent scientists and political statesmen endorsed it. Pop stars fretted about it. Much as they do today about another topic near and dear to our hearts.

So there were some sceptical economists saying it was all bunk, the projections based on false assumptions and misleading propaganda, that things were getting better and that the future would in fact be brighter than it has ever been, if we would only carry on as we were. Technology and ever more economic development were by far the most hopeful means with which to save ourselves.

They were, of course, criticised for being recklessly overoptimistic, and motivated by a greedy intention to carry on with their own personal overconsumption.

So how should such an economist have responded if asked what their “back-up plan” was in the hypothetical case the population doomsters had been right? So you don’t like the idea of forced sterilisation camps and rationing – what measures would you like, to save us all from the coming apocalypse? How, realistically, can you save us from overpopulation except by forcibly reducing the population?

It is essentially the same question, posed by the same political movement today. What do you expect us to say this time round?

LOL, talk about totally avoiding the question. It was a very simple question. If the climate change skeptics end up being wrong, what is your back up plan?

You then went on a 4 paragraph tirade about economic disasters being more likly then climate disasters and in doing so 100% avoided the main question.

So really this should be titled,

“How I managed not to answer a very simple question by Andrew Revkin”

But I haven’t claimed any of those to be the case, and nor are they.

I am. But it’s exactly that sort of non-sequitur that makes everybody here think you’re not. Why does a statement that I debate the likes of you for practice imply that I am either irrational, or not interested in a scientific discussion?

You follow, to some degree, a very familiar pattern. A lot of AGW believers patronisingly claim a superior scientific knowledge, but most show only a familiarity with the most basic arguments (and an ability to Google). They constantly insinuate that sceptics are or must be scientifically ignorant or incompetent. They demand the highest levels of academic rigour, precise wording, definitions, and references even in casual blog debate from others, and will pick up on any lapse as laughable incompetence. They claim the science is simple, and give schoolboy physics explanations that grossly oversimplify the subject, but if you point out the flaws they act like it’s your fault for not having understood that. They often can’t then expand on the simple version quickly with a more sophisticated version. They rely heavily on appeals to authority – peer review and the imprimatur of professional bodies. They commonly dismiss sceptical science by discrediting the authors rather than the content. They use flawed arguments, many of them picked up from AGW popularisations, like correlation implying causation, affirming the consequent, circular logic, misunderstanding definitions, raising strawmen, and ignoring uncertainties. They refuse to believe that they could possibly be biased or thinking irrationally themselves. They commonly have only a primitive, rather intuitive understanding of statistics, and little understanding of the philosophy of science. They constantly intersperse the science (if there is any) with snide and insulting asides. And they never, ever, concede any point, admit to being in error on anything, or thank an opponent for providing a perspective or piece of information they hadn’t previously known. Should their position become visibly untenable, they just silently switch to attacking another element – some irrelevant throwaway comment or poorly worded flub that makes no difference to the essential point.

In short, AGW believers are just like everyone else you find on the internet.

As I said previously, you’re better than many I have come across. You seem to have picked up a wider range of the standard arguments than usual, are willing to follow a contrary line of argument some of the way, and despite the comments from others elsewhere, you’re a lot more polite than some I’ve come across. Not all the characteristics apply. But having talked with you for some time, I’m also totally confident now that there is absolutely nothing I could say to you that would lead you to change your mind on AGW. And while there are thousands of scientists around who know a lot more about climatology than I do, you’re clearly not one of them, so I don’t think I’m going to learn anything interesting that might lead me to change or modify my position. Given that, the only reason to hold this conversation at all is for the entertainment and practice.

If you don’t mind me asking, why are you debating here? You clearly are spending some considerable time and effort to be here, as a guest on private property and in an alien community. Is it to try to educate people? As a form of political activism? Out of annoyance that there are people out there who don’t agree with you? Or because a good argument is intellectually stimulating, and a lot of fun?

For practice.

By “it is best that it happen when it’s ready to” I mean that it is best to let events like technological shifts happen naturally. The market determines the optimum trade off between the rising cost of delay and the falling cost of implementation. Or at least, it does so better than any government can.

It isn’t the case that 0% of scientific articles say that – only popular articles by arts graduates say so. There is a clear majority that favour, or at least accept AGW theory, but surveys have found about 20-30% of climate scientists to be sceptical. It is more difficult to get sceptical positions published (itself an indictment of journal bias) but there are quite a few that are. (McIntyre and McKittrick being a particularly famous example.) And many that are not, such as the IPCC’s, are not quite as supportive of alarmism as one might think if you read only the press statements and summaries for policymakers. It’s because you seem totally unaware of this that I’m suspecting media influence. I’m otherwise confused by your position.

Lomborg makes a particular point of backing up his arguments with statistics and references, from organisations like the United Nations, official government statistics publications, peer reviewed journals, and so on. In particular, because of this principle he follows, he’s taken the line that the IPCC version on climate is the ‘official’ version and is therefore a believer in man made global warming. (A point on which I disagree with him.) All he does is point out the bits of that official science that the popularisers don’t emphasise, or its less obvious implications. Lomborg is on the side of published science, and is by no means popular as a result. If you dismiss him without having read him like that, then I can only assume you’re going by popular media dismissals of his position. If you had read him, you would know that your characterisation was inaccurate.

But like I said, I’m not going to debate Lomborg.

You seem to think I would derive my opinions from media articles. The media is dominated by arts graduates and is notably poor at understanding and communicating science. That’s why 50% of popular articles on global warming suggest that humanity might not be the cause, when 0% of scientific articles say that. Go to the source. Read the journal papers. You still need some scientific judgement, of course, but it’s much more reliable than believing what you read in the media. Acid rain – start with this. Got a link to substantiate your claim about poor surveying? Oil spills – this paper shows that effects are long lasting. But these are side issues. What makes you think that, just because the world has survived many minor environmental problems, global warming must be a minor environmental problem? That is a non sequitur.

If you believe Lomborg, then you’re trusting the popular media over the published science, again.