Are you "No True Scotsman"ing the phrase "climate activist"? Because I would say that people like Noah Smith, Ezra Klein, and many, many others agree that conditions are better now than they ever have been, that fossil fuels are a large part of that, and yet that eventually phasing out most fossil fuel use will be part of a better future, in part because of the climate effects.
"The government’s subsidizing and mandating of solar and wind has caused massive destruction around the world. Solar and wind, while sometimes good for remote locations that need very little electricity, have been a disaster when applied to the massive and dynamic electricity needs of the empowered world."
This seems way to strong to me and I would like to see the evidence of it. I am most familiar with the Texas power market, but wind and solar have not caused "massive destruction" even though there has been massive growth.
Now I agree that we are not getting rid of fossil fuels anytime soon, but this is just hyperbole that makes me question a lot of his other facts.
I feel like Alex Epstein's argument does a good job of convincing me that I should be emotionally very thankful and appreciative of fossil fuels. Okay, I'm convinced. Fossil fuels have given us many, many great things since the dawn of the industrial revolution.
I'm worried, though, about the jump to "and therefore we should not do anything about increased CO2 in the atmosphere". It seems like both of these things can be true at the same time - that fossil fuels provide great benefits to humankind, and that there is an important danger to be concerned about, and we may need to stop using fossil fuels. We may just be in a very tough situation - where fossil fuels have too many benefits to give up, but they are also leading to long run disaster. If both of these arguments are true, are we just screwed?
Therefore I think the right conclusion to take is not really, "fossil fuels are great", but that we need a third path that can both make Alex Epstein happy and stop the growth of CO2 in the atmosphere. In other words, we really need more nuclear power. Perhaps we have 100 years rather than 10 years. But that doesn't mean we should do nothing right now. We should raise the status of working on nuclear power and try harder to resolve its pending political issues.
As noted, I think he gives away the game by painting *all* climate activists with the same brush, and hyperbole on the "damage" of renewables. I wonder what he would think of my global warming and Greta T chapters in https://www.losingmyreligions.net/
a climate activist is an ideologized individual, an adept to a religion. These traits prevent him from engaging in a factual, data driven, rational conversation that would empathize with different ideas. It is all emotionally and closed mind driven. but the real pity is that political leaders and global institutions are actually chasing and feeding the madness while destroying their credibility. in the end they will tell us "yes we exaggerated and maybe lied but it was for a good cause". same approach as for lockdowns
I agree that Epstein does a very good job of steelmanning for most things.
The one that he doesn't, imo, is the "2 degrees then increasing/accelerating..." (i.e. "tipping point") idea. It is the one place he doesn't steelman, and indeed seems to lack epistemic humility in his repeated statements that it's practically a certainty that it won't happen.
IMO his thesis would be far stronger if he said something like:
"Look, I can't guarantee you that the "tipping point" won't happen. I just showed you why it is very unlikely, far less likely than the mainstream knowledge system is claiming.
But the policies we are pursuing not only aren't guaranteed to prevent the possibility of said tipping point, they leave billions in the world far less better off in terms of the ability to adapt to future changes in climate, place a disproportionate portion of the burden on the backs of the world's poor who don't have low cost reliable highly available energy now, while also leaving the rest of the world less able to invest in adaptation or even "global cooling" technologies that might reverse the effects of any such tipping point because of the terrible economic efficiency and practicality of the "net zero by 2050" push."
The one thing he does NOT in fact steelman is the *possibility* of AGWC (the 2 or 3 degrees of warming, and accelerating from there... case)
He does a great job showing it is unlikely, bu he spins and deflects in classic Bil Clinton stlye as he seems to imply that said "existential risk" case is not just very unlikely (a cliam with which I agree and he pushed me further into that camp) but all-but-impossible.
Alex IMO would have much more credibility - and certainly with the Tylers of the world - if he acknowledged that there is a non-zero chance of AGWC, but despite said non-zero chance, most of the policies that leftists are proposing will do more harm than good, and almost certainly all of the policies they are proposing will do siginficant harm to the world's poorest 4 billion or so, and leave those people less able to adapt to climate change in teh AGWC case, and massively worse off in the 98%++ non-AGWC case.
Zion Lights is the exception that comes to mind. Previously an Extinction Revolutionary, she renounced all that and is now, among other things, a strong nuclear supporter. How much does nuclear get discussed in Epstein's book?
Hey Bryan, maybe don’t elevate faux-scientific climate deniers? I’ve watched you morph into an absolute cretin over the years, just swallowing and regurgitating right-wing myths under some guise of academic “thought”. Fuckin pathetic, you should be ashamed at what you’ve become. get your shit together, moron
Better than ever in history does not mean currently "excellent". In fact, his argument depends on highlighting many ways in which things are not excellent
I've never heard a self-described "climate activist" optimistic about anything except their certainty that we are in dire circumstances.
I feel that this all highlights the fact that most climate/environemental activists are profoundly anti-human.
Are you "No True Scotsman"ing the phrase "climate activist"? Because I would say that people like Noah Smith, Ezra Klein, and many, many others agree that conditions are better now than they ever have been, that fossil fuels are a large part of that, and yet that eventually phasing out most fossil fuel use will be part of a better future, in part because of the climate effects.
"The government’s subsidizing and mandating of solar and wind has caused massive destruction around the world. Solar and wind, while sometimes good for remote locations that need very little electricity, have been a disaster when applied to the massive and dynamic electricity needs of the empowered world."
This seems way to strong to me and I would like to see the evidence of it. I am most familiar with the Texas power market, but wind and solar have not caused "massive destruction" even though there has been massive growth.
Now I agree that we are not getting rid of fossil fuels anytime soon, but this is just hyperbole that makes me question a lot of his other facts.
I feel like Alex Epstein's argument does a good job of convincing me that I should be emotionally very thankful and appreciative of fossil fuels. Okay, I'm convinced. Fossil fuels have given us many, many great things since the dawn of the industrial revolution.
I'm worried, though, about the jump to "and therefore we should not do anything about increased CO2 in the atmosphere". It seems like both of these things can be true at the same time - that fossil fuels provide great benefits to humankind, and that there is an important danger to be concerned about, and we may need to stop using fossil fuels. We may just be in a very tough situation - where fossil fuels have too many benefits to give up, but they are also leading to long run disaster. If both of these arguments are true, are we just screwed?
Therefore I think the right conclusion to take is not really, "fossil fuels are great", but that we need a third path that can both make Alex Epstein happy and stop the growth of CO2 in the atmosphere. In other words, we really need more nuclear power. Perhaps we have 100 years rather than 10 years. But that doesn't mean we should do nothing right now. We should raise the status of working on nuclear power and try harder to resolve its pending political issues.
As noted, I think he gives away the game by painting *all* climate activists with the same brush, and hyperbole on the "damage" of renewables. I wonder what he would think of my global warming and Greta T chapters in https://www.losingmyreligions.net/
a climate activist is an ideologized individual, an adept to a religion. These traits prevent him from engaging in a factual, data driven, rational conversation that would empathize with different ideas. It is all emotionally and closed mind driven. but the real pity is that political leaders and global institutions are actually chasing and feeding the madness while destroying their credibility. in the end they will tell us "yes we exaggerated and maybe lied but it was for a good cause". same approach as for lockdowns
Answer to "Have you?" No.
I agree that Epstein does a very good job of steelmanning for most things.
The one that he doesn't, imo, is the "2 degrees then increasing/accelerating..." (i.e. "tipping point") idea. It is the one place he doesn't steelman, and indeed seems to lack epistemic humility in his repeated statements that it's practically a certainty that it won't happen.
IMO his thesis would be far stronger if he said something like:
"Look, I can't guarantee you that the "tipping point" won't happen. I just showed you why it is very unlikely, far less likely than the mainstream knowledge system is claiming.
But the policies we are pursuing not only aren't guaranteed to prevent the possibility of said tipping point, they leave billions in the world far less better off in terms of the ability to adapt to future changes in climate, place a disproportionate portion of the burden on the backs of the world's poor who don't have low cost reliable highly available energy now, while also leaving the rest of the world less able to invest in adaptation or even "global cooling" technologies that might reverse the effects of any such tipping point because of the terrible economic efficiency and practicality of the "net zero by 2050" push."
Too much to wish for?
I love the book, and most of Alex' replies.
The one thing he does NOT in fact steelman is the *possibility* of AGWC (the 2 or 3 degrees of warming, and accelerating from there... case)
He does a great job showing it is unlikely, bu he spins and deflects in classic Bil Clinton stlye as he seems to imply that said "existential risk" case is not just very unlikely (a cliam with which I agree and he pushed me further into that camp) but all-but-impossible.
Alex IMO would have much more credibility - and certainly with the Tylers of the world - if he acknowledged that there is a non-zero chance of AGWC, but despite said non-zero chance, most of the policies that leftists are proposing will do more harm than good, and almost certainly all of the policies they are proposing will do siginficant harm to the world's poorest 4 billion or so, and leave those people less able to adapt to climate change in teh AGWC case, and massively worse off in the 98%++ non-AGWC case.
Zion Lights is the exception that comes to mind. Previously an Extinction Revolutionary, she renounced all that and is now, among other things, a strong nuclear supporter. How much does nuclear get discussed in Epstein's book?
Hey Bryan, maybe don’t elevate faux-scientific climate deniers? I’ve watched you morph into an absolute cretin over the years, just swallowing and regurgitating right-wing myths under some guise of academic “thought”. Fuckin pathetic, you should be ashamed at what you’ve become. get your shit together, moron
I cannot see a connection.
The world was on track to run out of whales. We have abundant fossil fuels.
Whale oil was an innovation because it burned cleaner and brighter.
Then came kerosene which was even cleaner and brighter-- and hugely abundant.
Better than ever in history does not mean currently "excellent". In fact, his argument depends on highlighting many ways in which things are not excellent
The climate activists’ unstated assumption is…
that replacing fossil fuels is possible.
It is not.
Global reserves as a percentage of what is needed to phase-out fossil fuels
copper 19.2%
nickel 10.1%
lithium 2.3%
vanadium 3.5%
This is for just first-generation investment. It ignores replacements.
Time needed for first generation investment, at current rates of production
copper 189 years
nickel 400 years
lithium 9921 years
vanadium 7101 years
These estimates are based on detailed research.
It does not matter if they are wrong by a factor of 2 -- or even 5.
Source: https://tupa.gtk.fi/raportti/arkisto/42_2021.pdf