George Will, the iconoclastic wordsmither known for his bow ties and occasional attempts at polysyllabic obfuscationism, has another post on global warming out today. He's learned his lesson, apparently: there's a lot less mining of skeptical inaccuracies in this one. Rather, Will descends to the level of lampoonery by basically making fun of his ideological opposites. He notes the hyperbolic language that has been used by some politicians in the run-up to the Copenhagen meeting, as sounding at bit over-the-top in terms of the catastrophic consequences of climate change, and then he descends to the level of ignorant bastard when he goes all United States-centric and ignores the plight of the rest of the world.
Which is typical behavior for a twit. (Definitionally, George: 1 : an act of twitting : taunt 2 : a silly annoying person : fool) Both of these are evident in what Will did in this column.
First of all, he makes fun of smart people. "Intelligent people agree that, absent immediate radical action regarding global warming, the human race is sunk. That is a tautology because those who do not agree are, definitionally, unintelligent." Well, Will, you made it up that it is the "intelligent people who agree". A lot of scientists agree on this, and scientists are usually intelligent. Two, nobody says the human race is "sunk" -- that's an exaggeration. Increased hardship is hardly sunk, but would you want to wish it on your grandkids? Will sets up the "us versus them" conflict, i.e., if you don't agree with us, you're stupid. That's bound to rouse the ire in the conservative hinterlands.
Let's try something else: "Intelligent people agree that, absent prudent house maintenance activities, you could end up spending a lot more money than you want to fixing up problems in your house when something breaks down." People that don't agree with this are, definitionally and operationally, unintelligent. YES, they are. Intelligent people plan for the future, try to anticipate likely problems in the future, come up with plans and strategies for dealing with potential problems, and implement those plans and strategies most likely to be successful. Intelligent people analyze, change strategies and tactics if necessary, and adapt to circumstances. Unintelligent people assume that if everything is hunky-dory at present there isn't any need to deal with a problem that isn't currently happening. And then they complain mightily that no one
told them that it would be a good idea for a yearly cleaning and tune-up on their air conditioning unit (even if they did) when it goes kaflooey and they have to shell out major buckage to get it fixed or get a new one.
Let's compare maintaining the air conditioner to global warming. If you could monitor the state of your working air conditioner, over time, you would start to notice little indicators that it is aging. The filter is getting covered with dust. The fan belt or gear is getting warm. The unit is drawing a little more power because it isn't running as smoothly as it did when it was new. Things like that. Looking toward the future with these changes, it could eventually be reasonably predicted that the air conditioner would eventually stop working. Is immediate radical action needed when you notice these indicators? Not really -- unless you (the owner) doesn't understand what they could lead to. Then immediate radical action is needed to kick the owner in the keister to get him to start implementing prudent measures to maintain the unit before it breaks down.
So that's why intelligent people -- I'm leaving Will out of that category at this point -- are trying to wake up the slumbering masses that the indicators are there that the system cannot be left unattended, or something catastrophic, at an unpredictable future time, WILL break down. In terms of Earth and ecosystems, this won't be an all-at-once event, but it very likely will be a major shift, such as the sudden realization on the Grand Banks that there weren't enough potato cod to make it worthwhile to fish for them any more. Oops. We missed those indicators and predictions and calls for radical action when radical action still could have made a difference.
Now, Will does get some things right. China and India are not going to lead this effort when they're still trying to catch up to the Western powers who got wealthy on cheap energy and polluted the world and set it on this course, unless the Western powers collectively accept their responsibility and role in this. The U.S. has to do so, too. Obama's trying, but the institutional inertia of Congress (which Will acutely notes is laden with righteous actions of don't do as I do, do as I say mentality) is holding him back from firm commitments. And he doesn't want to promise what can't be delivered -- that would look bad for him, for how the world views us (which is more favorable than under the dumb Dubya, but not much) and even worse back home, giving the conservatives another victory to crow about.
So we are globally, collectively stuck with the problem of dealing with a situation that could have future dire scenarios, but like the fabled frog in the warming pot, the human public is too ignorant (and too uneducatedly populous) to be able to deal with it without
leadership. What is actually needed is the true movement of the masses -- something so compelling, so obviously bad, that the people of the world make a concerted call to action that can't be ignored. The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency and the Clean Water Act were motivated by the Cuyahoga River fire -- a river so polluted that it ignites is hard to ignore. The EPA and the amazing (despite its flaws) Endangered Species Act put the U.S. on a footing that other countries emulate with only partial success.
That's why I pine for a true world government -- that could have a global EPA with enforcement capability and a global Endangered Species Act that could step in right now and enforce carbon dioxide curbs to maintain polar bear populations and enforced bluefin tuna catch limits before that fishery goes the way of the potato cod. (Too bad the bluefin tuna doesn't have eco-tourist potential; more on that later, hopefully).
Now, what else does Will the twit do? He drags out the "global cooling" meme again -- totally frickin' utterly ignoring the advances in science that have occurred since then. This is something people do to sway their unintelligent, ignorant readers -- make arguments based on false premises and insufficient information. This is Will stooping to the level of Marc Morano and Anthony Watts, and that's WAY low. It's funny how he's talking about intelligent people and then quotes Newsweek -- if he'd quoted a scientific journal (where the intelligent people really hang out) the impression is much different, much more nuanced, and much clearer on the level of uncertainty. But making an intelligent argument is not Will's purpose here.
And finally he goes after notoriously unpredictable hurricane frequencies as a predictor of climate change consequences -- which is funny in retrospect when we read "As this year's Atlantic hurricane season ends, only three hurricanes have formed -- half the average of the past 50 years -- and none has hit the United States." Funny when Ida -- which is not an Atlantic hurricane, I am aware -- is about to hit the United States.
The twit nature of this is that it ignores what's happening elsewhere. El Nino -- not truly an event yet until the end of December, so hold on to your hats -- influences hurricane formation in the Atlantic. That's one reason they're suppressed this year. And what else is happening? The Phillipines get hit with three in six weeks, Ketsana, Parma, and Mirinae (almost five, Lupit just barely turned north before running them over, and Koppu went north); Taiwan gets smashed by Morakot earlier in the year, killing more than 600 people (Morakot even caused flooding in the Phillipines, too), and Japan got side-swiped by Melor.
In fact, the Pacific storm season, which peaks from May to November, was so busy this year that the storms couldn't get out of each other's way:
(thanks, NASA)
So, to sum up: as if we needed more evidence, on the subject of climate change, George Will, is a twit -- a dangerous, widely-read, widely-listened-to, twit. I wish I could grab that bowtie and pull it tight around his scrawny neck while I tried to reason with him. Maybe then he'd listen, but he'd probably just consider me an intelligent person because of my concern about the issue.
