Figuring things out for yourself is practically the only freedom anyone really has. Use that freedom. (Jean Rasczak, Starship Troopers)
I know that during the next thirty years it will sink in, to everyone who is actually in a position to make or implement policy, that The End of Cheap OilTM and Anthropogenic Global WarmingTM are straightforward technical problems with straightforward technical solutions. I have that much naive optimism in the capacity of our species.
I know that during the next thirty years I will turn on the television and see a lake of fire where a major city used to be, because the hegemon has forgotten how the rest of the world plays the game and has thrown the ball down in the end zone. I have that much naive optimism in the capacity of James Baker et al.
9 comments:
Someone has replied to your Realclimate question re: models. apart from the snarky link to a site about stonehenge :-/, the 1990 climate scientists seem to correctly apportion CO2 forcings and effects from volcanoes (and other particulates) to measured temperatures. IMHO Models re extreme weather events are very unlikely to prove useful as practical predictive tools in the same way.
On the other hand, the ratio of anthropogenic particulate emissions to anthropogenic CO2 emmissions is probably at its lowest ever.
Re your first para: I agree. I'd just prefer that at least some effort is made to reduce the probability of the Great Resource Wars before our miraculous technological revolution saves us.
Re para 2: Maybe, maybe not. Not entirely certain what your point is...?
Now, my white-hot, diamond-hard core of rage has to do with the fact that there was an opportunity to avoid a regional nuclear arms race in the Middle East; there was a chance to 'drain the swamp' and cast down despots from their thrones like so many ninepins; and it looks like the World Power has basically decided it can't be bothered. It made a half-hearted effort in Afghanistan, and a half-hearted effort in Iraq, and when things got electorally difficult decided to bring back twits like James Baker.
The painful thing is not that they are the worst of the West: they are the best. The best is not good enough. Our civilisation is out of gumption. This might not have worried me in some of my more wild-eyed moments in 1999, but all those 'martyrdom operations' have thoroughly sickened me on politicised Islam as a force for good. And they are soft on the abortionists anyway.
So... dunno. Probably I will stop reading the papers, and once I have blogged out the final season of Angel, chuck in this blogging thing for a lark.
That's harsh! There is also the issue that there wouldn't have been even half-hearted efforts in the middle east without megaterrorism. If there had been successful megaterrorist followups in the US, your vision might have become reality. The vision will infact have to wait until after the lake of fire event before it will be a backable policy. Blogging is also not voluntary but mandated by God himself.
I'd miss the Accidental Blog if it disappeared, but if it's not working for you, you should totally ditch it (for a while at least).
Your ideals about how the world should be and mine don't (always) overlap much. But that doesn't mean I don't want to hear about them.
(I want to be more eloquent and persuasive and positive, but I'm fluey and frankly feel like shit, so please read some level of optimism between the lines here).
Thanks guys! Maybe it is your intervention, but I feel much less irate about the world today, for no rational reason.
If this blog were to disappear it would be a crime against blogging. It is an oasis in a desert of "Today I did.." Every time I see you've blogged, I immediately read it. I always feel I've learnt something or been given something to think about.
Gosh, thanks again! I wasn't just fishing for compliments, honest. At least, I hope not.
I feel sometimes that this Dr Clam persona gets carried away, and is more emphatic than it ought to be... While I think it is right and proper that I rant vigorously about things that I feel strongly about, I sometimes find Dr Clam ranting vigorously about things I don't feel *that* strongly about. I shall endeavour to keep this under control.
Post a Comment