i think Froggie's point about the battlers has to be addressed, Sams. especially the billions of battlers who aren't "emitting" at even a fraction of the rate that we are. How do you propose they should get a decent standard of living, or should they go on living a simple agrarian life and die young for our sake?

If if is getting warmer, don't we have to address that, regardless of the reason? Don't we really have to look at ways that the world can use MORE power for MORE people, who may need technological power-driven solutions for a hotter world? Or even a colder one, if the ice age cometh on account of the Gulf Stream stuffing up? Or just a plain old world with more people in it?

Bugsy: "And then in 40 years time, when our grandchildren ask us we can tell them what we did. Will you be proud to tell them?" That's an interesting question because we've been talking about what we believe, not what we do! I've already told you I'm into having an even better world I'd like to know what you Bugsy, and you, Sams, think about nuclear power in that regard. I am open to the idea that we may need it. that we may need more of it, AGW or not. And Bugsy, what SHOULD I do so I can feel proud to tell them? Just believe?

Well Crock, when they ask, what will you tell them? It's up to you man. Depending on what you think may happen you can tell them, "well I turned out the lights and rode my bike and made sure I didn't use too much water (or at least not more than the average) and wrote profusely on the internet that non-fossil fuel power sources should be used more widely."

However, I get the feeling that you hope you won't have to explain what you did at all, that you hope that nothing's wrong. That you hope that we didn't cause anything of what they will be experiencing. Maybe they won't be experiencing what the scientists are modeling. You could say "Well, we didn't believe that humans caused the warming, and anyway it required a great amount of political will that just wasn't possible, because we believed that the socialists/fascists/commies/lefties/greenwashers/[insert derogatory term of choice here] were behind that kind of collectivist thinking."

But of course, you may not have to answer. You are merely making sure that we don't......what exactly are you making sure we don't do exactly? Impoverish ourselves?

Look I hope that everything you talked about, more power for more people (without worrying about the ecological cost or how much we may contribute to that) is the answer, I really do, then I will be a fool (not the only one of course). But I don't just make my plans on hope.

"the billions of battlers who aren't "emitting" at even a fraction of the rate that we are. How do you propose they should get a decent standard of living, or should they go on living a simple agrarian life and die young for our sake?"

By developing our tech so that "decent standard of living" doesn't equate a lot of CO2 emissions. Having visited Ethiopian for a short time, and having a daughter adopted from there, I can assure you that I am well aware of the issues. What *will* affect them to a large extent if we don't act is the impact of climate change on their food supply, which is already notoriously prone to climate variability.

"By developing our tech so that "decent standard of living" doesn't equate a lot of CO2 emissions."

I still don't agree that CO2 emissions are a problem, but there is one "tech" that doesn't equate a lot of CO2 emissions- nuclear. The greens of course won't have a bar of it, even though it has been proven to be safe and clean, notwithstanding Chernobyl and Three Mile Island. Certainly a lot cleaner than using coal at present, although Vattenfall say that CCS can help in this regard:

http://www.vattenfall.com/www/vf_com/vf_com/370103press/1344388css-p/index.jsp

Of course, the greens are sceptical about this technology:

http://www.treehugger.com/files/2008/05/more-carbon-capture-at-german-coal-plants.php

So it seems their answer is more wind turbines or solar power, which currently costs two or three times more than fossil fuels and are not as effective. Maybe advances in technology will improve them.

As a matter of interest, here is yet another "climate changing" hypothesis.

http://www.lmtg.obs-mip.fr/index.php?option=com_lmtg_myhomepage&lmtg_subject=admin&lmtg_item=24

Thanks Bugsy. Scientists can be pretty clever when it comes to practical solutions based on economic imperatives. Witness more fuel-efficient cars, more effective light bulbs, solar panels. etc.

ECOnomy and ECOlogy should be seen as friends, not ideological opponents. I would not for a moment think that "more power for more people (without worrying about the ecological cost or how much we may contribute to that) is the answer". I don't think we should tolerate smog, lead poisoning , acid rain, and any other nasties such as Chernobyl-style events. I also believe we should constantly strive to create less waste, and find ways to reuse our waste, and that we should be working hard to create genuinely sustainable sources of water and power. All these are imperatives for an overpopulated world .... as is the need to acknowledge that most of the world needs more power.

I keep telling my AGW-endoctrinated kids to turn off THEIR lights because I believe these things. But I DON"T think we should be imbuing our children with fear, pessimism and despair. At the moment I am in the process of converting our Alice Springs back yard into a food source, because I do think we need to rethink our incredibly wasteful food production policies. If that all sounds like the precautionary principle, well it’s not, although I could be convinced of it . I am concerned that if we act on the basis that AGW is an indisputable fact, people will abandon a commonsense approach to the environment if it is shown to be wrong. So if there is a way we could move forward on that basis, instead of having to act as if we totally believe in something which is fundamentally unproven, I would be for all that.

The policies addressing AGW are essentially dealing with efficiencies in technology and reducing reliance on fossil fuels. What you and many other people fail to understand is that the great majority of scientific theories are essentially unproven, but this is not to say that they don't have evidence supporting them. AGW has a LOT of evidence supporting it. This evidence has been reviewed by a lot of top level scientists with a great deal of integrity and knowledge of the field and found to require political action and cooperation if mitigation of potential catastrophe is to occur. This is essentially the point of Sams post that you had such trouble with -you though that it was a fallacious appeal to authority, but that is an error. Not all appeals to authority are fallacious and in this case it carries weight.

As for "imbuing our children fear, pessimism and despair", is that what you think this is all about? On the contrary, I see it as teaching them the consequences of profligacy, something that previous generations haven't had to deal with on such a scale. I actually think that the nuclear scares of the Cold War scared the bejeezus out of people much more than this problem and so does terrorism today and thats only because they could recognise the immediacy and nature of the threat. Make no mistake, the threat is real, and by its very nature if you aren't a part of the solution then you are a part of the problem. Think about it carefully.