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Loading...Famed Climate Change Skeptic Changes His Mind
Danish political scientist and statistician Bjorn Lomborg, alternately hailed and cursed for claiming that efforts to reduce carbon emissions were not worth the money, now suggests that combatting climate change should be the top global priority. For years, Lomborg did not deny manmade climate change; he simply did not think it important enough, according to his calculations, to do anything about. Now he has come up with a new set of equations (and a new book) and is advocating that the world spend $100 billion a year to mitigate and deal with the results of carbon emissions.
“The point I’ve always been making,” he told the Guardian “is, it’s not the end of the world. That is why we should be measuring up to what everybody else says, which is we should be spending our money well.”
Lomborg, author of The Skeptical Environmentalist and other works, was never a climate change denier. He attracted a lot of publicity for suggesting in 2004 that fighting climate change would basically cost more than the benefit that would be attained, and that we’d be better off spending more money to cure HIV AIDS or other issues He has since come out with new calculations calling for massive investment in clean energy technology and exploration of the controversial practices of geoengineering, where natural phenomena are manipulated to reverse greenhouse gas effects.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2010/aug/30/bjorn-lomborg-climate-change-u-turn
Bjorn Lomborg has been controversial for years. A Lomborg debunking industry sprang up in the wake of his pronouncements, with websites, editorials and an entire book (Howard Friel and Thomas Lovejoy’s The Lomborg Deception) dedicated to exposing the faults in his logic and his research. Yet he was also acclaimed for his “practical” approaches to the calculations around human life and risk in tackling global issues. TIME magazine named him as one of the 100 most influential people of 2004, dubbing him the “Martin Luther of the environmental movement.” Even the left-leaning Guardian included him on their 2008 list of 50 people who could save the planet.”
The Guardian quoted Lomborg this week: “This is not about ‘we have all got to live with less, wear hair-shirts and cut our carbon emissions’. It’s about technologies, about realising there’s a vast array of solutions.” He is right about the need for a multitude of approaches. The truly complex issue of climate change will not respond to dogmatic, single solutions from anyone, skeptic or believer. We need to pull together — now — and consider a variety of ways to tackle the issue, both technological and behavioral, including investment in research, clean energy technologies, conservation, carbon taxes, and more. Let’s hope we can make room for anyone, even a latecomer convert, to the big tent of those honestly working for a better world.
Read more: clean energy, climate change, global warming, lomborg, skeptic, sustaintmc
Photo: via iStockphoto
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132 comments
+ add your ownAll he said was it wasnt worth the money, now that he is getting money from it, he is all for it. Follow the money, $100's of millions buys lot of cooperation for this scam.
Follow the money.....
Hopefully it will mean something and bring positive changes
very nice
I'm with Laurie on this one. I just want to find out and make sure others find out how to prioritize when taking care of the planet. One of my major concerns with reactions to reports of global warming is #1 on this list:
http://depletedcranium.com/the-top-ten-things-enviornmentalists-need-to-learn/
If we wreck the economy barking up the wrong tree, we will not have the investment-capital that we need for useful projects. Then again, if anthropogenic climate-change through CO2 emissions really is a problem, I want conclusive evidence to get the skeptics on board with a solution. (Skeptics also tend to be very effective problem-solvers.)
You know it can be argued all day long, but the truth is we or noone will know for sure until it is too late. What is important is that we do realize that we are not taking care of our planet and that is not good and if global warming does happen who is going survive to say "I was right". We need to take care of our earth as well or better than we take care of ourselves and our families.
Just to be clear for anyone who has not read the entire back-and-forth between me and Davie, these are the primary flaws I see in the analyses which drive my continued skepticism. There is another very technical one which I will discuss if anyone asks.
The ice-core data is extremely susceptible to albedo-effects from settling particulate matter. There is an anthropogenic cause for that (coal-burning), but it does not translate into equivalent warming elsewhere. Also, I understand the South Pole was completely ignored in the data-set. As bad as this is for the North Pole, this is not a global effect.
The model for translating tree-ring data into temperature-data failed to validate. That is, it failed to follow recorded temperatures. The translation is horribly inaccurate.
The weather-station data is subject to the heat-island effect. Cities are warmer than their surroundings by more than the predicted warming. Urban sprawl increases this difference, and the weather-stations are primarily in cities. Even those at airports fall victim here as cities grow to encompass airports which were originally built just out of town.
The satellite data goes too short a time. There is, for example, a known 100-year natural weather-cycle in North America of which the satellites would only have seen part. They cannot indicate whether this warming is a natural cycle or an unprecedented anthropogenic effect.
As far as I am aware, nearly all of them based their conclusions on the same analyses of ice-core data, the same sets of tree-ring data, the same weather-station data, or the same satellite-data. The first three of these were horribly flawed and the fourth was simply insufficient to claim an anthropogenic cause.
Some others have based their conclusions on much smaller data-sets which turned out to have been cherry-picked from much larger ones to support claims which the larger data would not have. The Himalayan glaciers are mostly advancing, despite a report that in an incredibly (and I do mean non-credibly) unlikely "accident" picked a few that were receding. With Russian tree-ring data, the person doing the analysis copied July data into August two years later and said he proved warming. There are a lot of these examples. I get excited whenever I see a new study, hoping to finally see something conclusive one way or the other and I look into them each time.
I am not entirely convinced they are all incapable of research. Consider how skeptics have been treated. In climate-science, it is not only within the scientific community where their reputations are at stake. Do you think, with the current media-climate and popular belief on the issue, that a national level organization could afford to let a skeptic into a leadership position? It would be seen as a sell-out and as non-scientific. No conspiracy, just politics and organizations looking out for their own well-being.
To finish my Sept. 12, 2:36 P.M. comment:
Unless you think the numerous worldwide scientific academies/institutions are all headed by delusional, unscientific meatheads who don't know how to derive scientific conclusions from scientific data.
Delusional conspiracy theories and other unsubstantiated assumptions/opinions can make for good entertainment, but rarely for good science
Hi Stephen,
I don't agree that all the climate institutes/scientists based their conclusions on the same analysis or that their research was flawed.
Scientific statements are derived from scientific data/research and so the data/research are corroborative. Because the numerous academies/scientists came to the same conclusion doesn't invalidate shared or independent data/research, but strengthens them. Scientifically, it would be illogical to promote/represent/support an unresearched/unsubstantiated statement; after all we're talking about science, not the latest Hollywood gossip. Scientific academies/institutes use and are dependent on scientific data/research to make conclusions. It's grade-school art classes and personal, unsubstantiated interpretations that involve fantasy.
Again, all, I believe, notable/recognized scientific climate institutions worldwide (leaving out the obviously preconceived conclusions of the unethical fossil-fuel greedsters and their bought governmental lackeys) agree that global warming/climate change is anthropogenic, based on some shared data/research and also on independent data/research. (See referenced Wikipedia article on scientific opinion on climate change.)
Also, "No scientific body of national or international standing has maintained a dissenting opinion."
Anthropogenic global warming is not a purple albatross with neon green polka dots. That would be confusing reality with fantasy.
Hi Davie,
My problem with the corroboration is that statements do not corroborate anything. Additional evidence and analyses corroborate. As far as I can tell, all of these groups have based their statements on the same evidence and analysis, and those analyses are seriously flawed.
Imagine if fifty people saw a purple albatross with neon green polka-dots, and then all fifty of them went ahead and said that such animals exist. By your logic, having all fifty of them saying so would "corroborate" the claim and give it credence. Would you then believe it? Nevermind the part where they were looking at a child's drawing.
Also, for Gea,
A skeptic only needs either "b", "c", and "e" of your list, or "d". You do not need infrastructure, funding, or personnel to read somebody else's work. Also, if you can find a serious error in it which would invalidate results, then you can remain skeptical of the claims, finding them unsupported by the analysis, without conclusively finding them to be wrong through correcting and publishing corrections. Just because, for example, I have not solved a problem, does not mean I cannot recognize an error when I see it. Still, I agree in principle that there is a major difference between a skeptic and a denier.
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