Global Warming and Human Advancement
It took a newspaper editorial to finally motivate me to start this blog. While I’ve been thinking about blogging about global warming for awhile, it was the opinion piece in the Las Vegas Review-Journal that actually got me moving.
The Review-Journal may be Nevada’s largest newspaper, but I certainly hope they don’t speak for the majority of the state’s citizens. In a June 2 editorial titled “Global warming? Hold on to your wallets,” which discussed a global warming bill in the Senate, the paper said, “left-wing environmentalists… see an opportunity to use this issue to cripple human advancement.”
Cripple human advancement? How, exactly, could a cap and trade program to limit global warming emissions cripple human advancement? The newspaper doesn’t exactly say, but they are quick to criticize the plan without offering a better solution.
I get irate when I hear voices criticizing efforts to ensure the continued existence of our planet and, yes, our very comfortable lifestyle when those same voices don’t have a better solution. If this isn’t the solution, then what is? Is there another bill pending in the Senate that the LVRJ would prefer to see passed instead? Or do they have another option? If so, I’d love to hear it.
But from the negative tone of the article and references to “those who worship at the church of global warming,” I suspect that the folks at the Review-Journal don’t really believe in global warming, or perhaps they think we should just sit back and do nothing until everyone else has already reduced their emissions. The paper’s statement about “what this will actually do to curtail ‘global warming’ remains murky, especially since India and China won’t be attending the parade,” fails to point out that the United States is a far worse polluter by size of population. China, which has 1.3 billion people, has only recently overtaken the U.S. as the largest emitter of global warming gases. And India, with a population of 1.1 billion, still pollutes less than the U.S.
So why does the editorial board of this newspaper feel justified in slamming a proposal that would take action? They feel that the proposal would “send energy prices through the roof.” Hello?? Have they not noticed that energy prices have been escalating for years, and we certainly can’t blame a trading system that hasn’t yet been adopted. So perhaps there are other forces driving up our prices, forces such as increasing demand from a society that uses energy for everything from running multiple TVs and computers to lighting office buildings in the middle of the night when nobody is there.
I would like to hope that we as a civilization can stop bickering about whether global warming is real, since scientists from around the world have already agreed on this point. Instead, we should start looking for solutions that will not only solve the problem, but also be good for people and the economy. The Review-Journal chooses to focus on one solution and criticize it due to the possible impact on energy costs, while failing to recognize that newer, cleaner sources of energy - such as solar, wind and biofuel - can help offset any negative financial impact we might feel from a trading program focused on fossil fuels.
And rather than “crippling human advancement,” changes we make to slow global warming could and should advance our society. Has the introduction of the Toyota Prius crippled society? I’d certainly say not. In fact, it has spurred one of the largest changes in automotive technology since the internal combustion engine was first used in the Model T, while helping consumers pinched by high gas prices and also emitting fewer global warming gases.
Crippling advancement? I don’t think so. The greatest threat to humankind’s advancement is not people trying to slow or reverse global warming through innovation and invention, but people trying to bury their head in the sand and cling to old ideas. Denial is always a far greater threat than action.
