A nice reply regarding the climate
From Vin Suprynowicz writing at the
Las Vegas Review-Journal:
VIN SUPRYNOWICZ: 'Greenland and the polar ice cap are melting'Commentary
Constant Californian writes to respond to my piece on the global cooling of 2008:"You may be aware of Bjorn Lomborg, a Danish scientist who was long skeptical of global warming," he writes. "He is not anymore. His complaint is with what he perceives as hysteria, and unsound policy. I wonder if your line of reasoning has more to do with ideology and your view of (proposed) policy, than a considered look at the science at work. The mechanism of global warming is well-established. ...
Vin quotes the rest of Constant Californian's concerns and then replies:
I replied:
Of course it would be more convenient for the Luddites if I were to accept their underlying assumptions and limit myself to "critiquing policy as regards energy and conservation." Just as, in 1500, it would have been judged much safer to study how best to discover and destroy witches rather than to challenge whether the old crones had any demonic powers in the first place.
As a matter of fact, challenging the existence of the supernatural powers of witches was prima facie proof that the challenger was himself a witch ("warlock," whatever), which was likely to get you burned.
Amazingly, under those circumstances, publicly expressed opinion -- holding that the demonic powers of witches was real -- was nearly unanimous! Ain't sealed systems grand?
And Vin is just getting warmed up. A wonderful (and detailed with links) rant.
The money quote:
Only collectivists consider they have any moral right to criticize the "profligacy" of those who create enough wealth to use whatever they can buy on the free market, in any way they choose, whether it be "energy," land or long underwear. Collectivists are would-be thieves. They simply lack the courage to pull out a gun and deprive the "profligate fat cats" of their wealth directly -- they prefer to hire bully-boys in government uniforms to do the job for them, under the sanctified cloak of "shared sacrifice."
The Greens don't want to see "energy efficiency." They want to artificially make energy so expensive that we're forced to accept "reduced expectations" for our lifestyles and life expectancies.
If the greens choose to use less energy, God bless them. Let them go squat around some jungle fire in loincloths, eating half-cooked monkey meat. But somehow, this prospect does not appear to please them. Somehow, they will be happy only if they can impose energy-deficient poverty on me.
Wonderfully stated.
Vin's blog is here:
Vin Suprynowicz
Posted by DaveH at January 5, 2009 9:07 AM