The Global Warming Heretic - NYTimes On Freeman Dyson

Sure, it's hard to measure some costs and some benefits. It's hard, even impossible, to objectively compare them. But it is important to acknowledge that trade-offs exist, and foolish to ignore them. The cost-benefit framework is useful for the reason that it forces people to look at the trade-offs.

It is foolish to give infinite value to the benefit of preserving nature. If we are willing to preserve nature at any price, then we ought to shut down industrial civilization, kill off 5.8 billion people, and go back to a hunter-gatherer lifestyle. However, few people think that cost would be worth the resulting benefits to the environment.

Ignoring the costs of environmental activism is short-sighted. Environmental restrictions are not free. They cause real deprivations. We ought to acknowledge these deprivations and consider whether or not they are worth the benefits, even if there is no objective "right" answer.

Sometimes we will decide environmental rules are worth it. Banning CFCs was probably a smart idea. Sometimes, however, we will decide environmental rules are not worth the cost. The Kyoto treaty would cost hundreds of billions of dollars to implement but only push off warming by a few years.

As for the rest of your posts, sorry I just can't follow the logic. I do think cost-benefit analysis is worthwhile, though.

It is not exactly "confusing". The problem (as I see it) is that the question "does man cause Global Warming?" is ill-posed.

OK, let us say that we have a mathematical model of the global climate: a bunch of partial differential equations describing heat and mass flow, etc etc etc. Since humans burn fuels and release C02 on the atmosphere, it is obvious that man influences the weather. The real question is not "whether", but "how much". The Sun's cycles also influence the weather. Varying levels of cosmic radiation also influence the weather.

And if it's possible that the climate is indeed changing dramatically, what does "global warming" actually mean? The max temperatures are rising? Or does it mean that the average temperatures are rising? This is such a complex problem that interpreting it as a "yes / no question" is infuriating to say the least. Some people want to compress the entire global climate problem in one single bit of information. It's pathetic.

And what pisses me off is that there are hords of ignorants who believe this is a "religious war" against big oil and corporate America and claim that anyone who dissents is an heretic who was bought by the dirty capitalists and who should be burned at the stake.