Re: [asa] Global Warming, Ethics, and the Precautionary Principle

Rich
Well said!
To which I would add that if we can address other problems with the same
mitigations, so much the better and in fact I assert such should be some
of the first actions taken

Smog in our cities is killing people and is getting worse and worse. In
the last couple of years in Picton, near to our cottage, there have been
summer smog alerts where people with respiratory and heart problems have
been warned to stay indoors and remain inactive. Picton is a small town
about 130 miles down wind from the Toronto-Hamilton-Missauga-Oshawa
complex and nothing in between seems obvious as a sufficient source of smog.

Even if Glenn and others are wrong about peak oil still the supply of
fossil fuel is finite and we should be conserving the resources we have,
this is only good stewardship. I rather doubt that the peak oil
predictions by geologists etc are very far wrong. Use of coal and tar
sands as a replacement still needs development.

Now we have to add climate concerns. Any remediation that can benefit
either any two of these concerns or even all three is a big win. For
example the short haul air shuttles between many many cities seems an
egregious waste. We should be investing in rail (water also)
transportation, even to the extent of laying down new track, new rolling
stock etc. While this action would likely only reduce smog a little, it
would seem to considerably reduce fuel use and GHG production both at
the same time.

Elimination of the use of SUVs to drive the kids to nursery school or to
get to work would have benefits in all three areas. And please I grew
up in east Africa and so do understand very well that there are a few
people who really do need an SUV. I have seen our jeep, on a major road,
stuck and throwing mud with all four wheels. One of the main points
that drivers of the big SUVs make is that with all the big trucks on the
highway, they need to be up high to see better and to have more metal
protecting them and the family. If rail transportation and container
terminals were really improved then considerably less inter city truck
traffic would be necessary thereby making at least one argument for SUVs
less believable. From a engineer friend who worked for a large
chemical company in purchasing and shipping, I understand that
Switzerland expects to eliminate trans Switzerland truck shipping in
favor of rail and that in general Europe has better facilities than does
North America for container handling. Perhaps we in North America need
to learn something from the Europeans! :-) I would expect that
eventually a fuel economy standard or a drastic rise in fuel price will
have to be used to coerce people out of these behemoths. Even though
the temporary gas price increase experienced in North America hurt
people's budgets, it was a good thing and had started pressure for more
fuel efficient cars and transportation.

If one action can have benefit in multiple areas then it would seem
easier to persuade people and the politicians to go along with it.

Dave

Rich Blinne wrote:
> On 1/25/07, David Opderbeck <dopderbeck@gmail.com> wrote:
>> Let's assume that the present consensus is right: global warming is a
>> real
>> problem that is substantially caused by human activity; and the possible
>> scenarios concerning future consequences of the problem range from
>> relatively moderate -- mostly regional disruption -- all the way to
>> catastrophic economic and social breakdown. What is the appropriate
>> ethical
>> stance for formulating public policy to address the problem?
>
> Upon further reflection regardless of who is right we come to the same
> conclusion. We must do moderate mitigation NOW. The worst case cannot
> be solved by mitigation and must be done by adaption. A useful legal
> fiction is to treat the difference between the two cases above as
> natural variability because even if the problem is caused by humans it
> cannot be fixed by them. There is a much greater difference between no
> mitigation and moderate mitigation and the likely and worst cases (cf.
> Jim Hansen's slides Randy posted of the differences between 1 degree C
> and 3 degree C warming). By being paralyzed by the uncertainty we
> turn the likely case into the worst case and THAT is immoral. What
> Katrina taught us is not that climate change is true but rather the
> effects of climate change fall disproportionally on the poor. If rich
> Christians do not want to be inconvenienced by even the most moderate
> of mitigations then they need to re-read the parable of the sheep and
> the goats.
>
> To sum up:
>
> 1. Plan mitigation based on the likely case because we simply cannot
> afford to solve the worst case.
>
> 2. Plan adaption based on the worst case. Since global warming is
> relatively slow errors in planning can be corrected as we see the real
> effects of climate change.
>
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Received on Fri Jan 26 12:00:19 2007