My Facebook friends seem to be combining two passions recently. One is spreading alarm regarding climate change/global warming. The second is advocating for more immigration to the U.S. I’m wondering how these can be consistent positions.
An increasingly common element of climate change alarmism is fretting about whether it is possible to be virtuous on the climate change issue while simultaneously adding to the overpopulation of Planet Earth by carbon-spewing humans. “Does climate change make it immoral to have kids?” (Guardian) is an example link from these Facebookers. An implicit message is that rich well-educated people in developed countries should further limit their reproduction (already below replacement levels, e.g., for college graduates in the U.S.).
Yet as noted above, the same folks express indignation at any suggestion that immigration to the U.S. be discouraged.
This chart of countries ranked by carbon emissions shows that a resident of the U.S. pushes about 19 metric tons of CO2 per year into the atmosphere. A resident of Syria, on the other hand, is responsible for only about 3.5 tons. A resident of Afghanistan or Somalia is pretty close to carbon-neutral.
If an important goal to these folks is saving Planet Earth via reducing carbon emissions, and it is so important that they would refrain from having children of their own, wouldn’t it make sense for them to oppose immigration from any country whose lifestyle is less carbon-intensive than the lifestyle of a U.S. resident?
[Note that the same folks who fret about climate change and push for more immigration also advocate financial subsidies for Americans who choose to have children. “San Francisco becomes first US city to mandate fully paid parental leave” (Guardian) is a typical article that leads to Facebook celebration. Why would you be eager to pay Americans to have children if you’re not sure that it is a good idea for anyone to have kids? (see also this post about whether employers or taxpayers should pay for the leave)]
I would suggest that the “should I have kids??” fear isn’t based on the effects of overpopulation at all (certainly the Guardian op-ed doesn’t suggest that). It’s the fear of bringing kids into a world that’s doomed. An example (my response).
For a literary illustration of this parental fear, see Cormac McCarthy’s “The Road.”
I like to think of global warming as a dam thrown across a river. The water accumulates behind the dam, slowly rising until it reaches the top (the new “equilibrium temperature” where outgoing thermal radiation balances incoming solar energy). The water has a long way to go yet to reach the top; and we keep raising the top of the dam. Why can’t we stop?
Why haven’t you figured out yet that this is all about virtue-signaling and not allowing oneself to be exiled from the liberal hive?
You usually can’t use logic to argue people out of positions that they hold for social and emotional rather than logical reasons.
Global warming alarmism exists for several reasons, of which “scientific validity” is the least important. There is an enormous gap between the proposition “human carbon emissions are causing the global temperature to be higher than it would otherwise be” and the proposition “we must implement laws which will very reliably cost trillions of dollars in reduced economic performance.” There are at least four major gaps which are simply assumed in by the alarmists in order to create the social pressure for the policies they want:
1) the amount of warming we are causing is significant rather than something which, against the background of normal historical fluctuations, amounts to a rounding error
2) despite the much larger swings in global temperature that humans have seen many times, the consequences of the planet being a couple of degrees warmer are definitely negative in the aggregate rather than positive
3) the policy proposals would actually reduce the global warming significantly
4) all of the much cheaper ways than these proposals for us to control global temperature, or the much cheaper ways than these proposals for us to remove carbon dioxide from the atmosphere if we actually want to control that variable rather than temperature, are off the table because it is virtuous to cut carbon emissions by a lot while a technological fix does not require people to demonstrate virtue or submit to being bossed around as much.
The common idea in Our Enlightened Europe is that the Obese, Flatulent and Downright Stupid citizens of the US of A dump CO2 in the atmosphere because of the aforementioned character flaws. Oddly the super enlightened people of the Holy North of Skandia also have a massive CO2 footprint: moral of the story, if people live in places that are damn cold (or damn hot) they will use energy to live in a tolerable indoor climate. The net result will be a increase of CO2 emissions. No need to postulate moral failings when climate brutality suffices.
A second moral in this story is, should the US of A invest in ultra energy efficient buildings and renewables, the per-person CO2 footprint will reduce, though it will never go below the natural threshold imposed by the local climate.
Joe: I don’t think lack of scientific evidence is the problem! In my favorite visualization of global warming, the large brown patches show 250 km x 250 km areas in which the average summertime temperature is more than three standard deviations higher than the 1951-1980 baseline. They should cover less than 1% of the Earth’s surface. Full paper. Back in 2003, a heat wave in Europe caused 70,000 premature deaths.
What keeps us from doing anything is that it’s a collective action problem: the full cost of reducing CO2 emissions (say by phasing out coal-burning power plants and replacing them with nuclear or whatever) is borne by the individual jurisdiction, while the benefits are spread out over the entire world. So you get a massive free-rider benefit from continuing to use fossil fuels. After all, they’re awesome.
It’s not easy being green:
Russil-
I think you’re overestimating the acceptance of climate change as crisis in the general population. Philg isn’t near as excited/concerned by it as he is women making money off of the fruits of their sexual labor, and he seems to have both above average IQ and an understanding of scientific method.
Sam
Russil, your use of standard deviations is pathetically naive. You have a time series which has oscillations of significant magnitude on many different time scales and yet you compute a “standard deviation” based on a small time sample (because that’s all you have good annual data for), purposely assuming away all longer-period components, and then you act as if “three sigma” on an out-of-sample period is shocking. The absolute global temperature has been much warmer and much colder many times for long periods throughout human history and prehistory.
Note that I am not denying here that human carbon dioxide emissions have caused the globe to be warmer now than it otherwise would have been, I am merely criticizing your statistical innumeracy.
Even more pathetic is your citation of the recent catastrophic French heat wave as if the number of deaths in ONE COUNTRY is the relevant figure for estimating a global average, when the ACTUAL TEMPERATURES are trivially available and do not indicate such an anomalously hot summer by historical standards when considered on a global or continental scale. The reason so many people died is sociological and well-understood, it was August and staffing at old-age homes was severely shortened because the whole country takes that month off, it was a national disgrace that they have learned from but is irrelevant to the science of global warming.
Sam: the collective-action nature of the problem means that it’s perfectly rational for Philip to not spend much time worrying about it. His individual contributions to the problem are tiny compared to the overall size of the problem.
Joe: The absolute global temperature has been much warmer and much colder many times for long periods throughout human history and prehistory.
Over very long time scales, sure. But natural variation isn’t what we’re seeing now. No matter how complex the Earth’s climate is, we know that it has to obey conservation of energy. When incoming solar energy = outgoing thermal radiation, the overall amount of energy in the Earth’s climate is stable.
We can measure incoming solar energy using satellites, so we know it hasn’t changed significantly over the last few decades. Reflectiveness of the Earth hasn’t changed significantly either. What’s changed, of course, is the composition of the atmosphere, as we’ve dug up and burned vast amounts of fossil fuels; the increased level of CO2 has reduced outgoing thermal radiation (again, verified using satellite measurements). So incoming solar energy > outgoing thermal radiation. By conservation of energy, the additional heat accumulates.
Even more pathetic is your citation of the recent catastrophic French heat wave–
(shrug) You wanted to know whether continued warming is threatening or benign. It’s a threat. As the temperature continues to rise, even if we can use air conditioning to prevent deaths in future heat waves, it’s going to be difficult to protect livestock, or people working outside.
I didn’t mean for this to turn into a debate about climate change per se. The people I was asking about are 100% convinced regarding Earth being turned into Venus by humans. The question is how people can hold two apparently contradictory beliefs simultaneously.
A sceptic might point out that both unrestricted immigration and the dismantling of our industrial economy tend towards the destruction of the American version of western civilization.
http://reason.com/archives/2011/11/20/green-on-the-outside-red-on-the-inside
Yes. Global warming and almost every other environmental problem (or alleged problem) could be alleviated by freezing all immigration, and deporting as many as possible.
it depends on the carbon footprint of immigrants when the US vs. there native country. Bad to assume immigrants have the same as native born.
> The question is how people can hold two apparently contradictory beliefs simultaneously.
They hope the enlightened incomers have much to teach the native population?