Re: [asa] Global Warming, Ethics, and Social Sciences

> Here is a story that reports on scenarios in which warming of that
> magnitude will provide net socio-economic benefits: http://www.wired.com/news/technology/0,66981-1.html?tw=wn_story_page_next1
> The possible benefits include fewer deaths from cold (which on balance
> might outweight the possibility of more deaths from heat), growth in the
> agriculture and forestry sectors, new global trade routes, and, oddly, more
> calamari.
>
> A recent book published by Yale (http://tinyurl.com/39mhl8*)* presents
> scenarios based on a 2.5 degree C increase over the next hundred years
> (which the book indicates is more severe than the assumptions of the IPCC
> report) and concludes that "the U.S. economy is not likely to be
> devastated by modest climate change."
>
> No one really knows.
>
> On 1/18/07, Al Koop <koopa@gvsu.edu> wrote:
> >
> > I believe the various scenarios you refer to affect the amount of
> > temperature increase. If the temperature increase is smaller, than the
> > effects will be lessened. I am saying that an average 6 degree Celsius
> > increase for the environment of biological organisms is significant and will
> > almost certainly negativley affect the majority of fauna and flora that
> > thrive in the area. That is my judgement I guess, but I am not aware of a
> > good biological paper that indicates that this magnitude of temperature
> > shift will frequently be beneficial for most of the inhabitants involved. I
> > would like to see plausible scenarios where the bars only reach orange or
> > stay green when an extensive ecosystem temperature is increased by 6 degrees
> > Celsius.
> >
> > Al
> >
> >
> > >>> "David Opderbeck" <dopderbeck@gmail.com> 01/18/07 12:59 PM >>>
> > Al, that's an interesting graph, but what is the basis for those scary
> > predictions? Another Wiki entry on the report notes that the report's
> > "predictions are based on scenarios, and the IPCC did not assign any
> > probability to the 35 scenarios used."
> > http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Third_Assessment_Report
> >
> > In fact, the IPCC report itself states with respect to socioeconomic
> > scenarios that *"Socioeconomic scenarios in general have been developed
> > to
> > aid decisionmaking under conditions of great complexity and uncertainty
> > in
> > which it is not possible to assign levels of probability to any
> > particular
> > state of the world at a future point in time. Therefore, it usually is
> > not
> > appropriate to make a statement of confidence concerning a specific
> > socioeconomic scenario"* (
> > http://www.grida.no/climate/ipcc_tar/wg2/127.htm)
> >
> > So, yes, we can create plausible scenarios in which all the bars on a
> > graph
> > turn red and society melts down. But we can also create plausible
> > scenarios
> > in which the bars only reach orange, or stay green. There doesn't
> > really
> > seem to be any real predictive "science" to this kind of
> > scenario-making,
> > which is why I included "social sciences" in the post title.
> >
> >
> >
>
>
> --
> David W. Opderbeck
> Web: http://www.davidopderbeck.com
> Blog: http://www.davidopderbeck.com/throughaglass.html
> MySpace (Music): http://www.myspace.com/davidbecke
>

-- 
David W. Opderbeck
Web:  http://www.davidopderbeck.com
Blog:  http://www.davidopderbeck.com/throughaglass.html
MySpace (Music):  http://www.myspace.com/davidbecke
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