Not long ago, the government issued a report on the effects of global warming. This narrative was mandated by congress and alleged that rising temperatures caused by man-made gases would result in adverse effects for the nation in the years to come.
This conclusion was not unexpected. Ever since politicians got into the environmental business, this has been the conventional wisdom. It is not that these office-holders are trained scientists. Far from it. As liberals, they gin up votes by promising to alleviate horrifying grievances. Global warming has thus become one of their favorite whipping boys.
Nonetheless, the recent report included facts that contradict the imminent environmental emergency they have been promoting. Buried within its pages were details that demonstrate the dangers we face are not nearly as ominous as alleged.
To begin with, the headline was that our national economy will decline by ten percent by the year 2100. That’s over eighty years from now and hence not a jaw-dropping figure. No wonder it was not trumpeted with the same gusto as previous predictions of doom.
Notice too that we are talking about the better part of a century from now. This implies that the projected rate of warming has been significantly lowered. In previous forecasts, the moment we will be in jeopardy was just around the corner. This made it possible for Barack Obama to argue that we had to do something immediately or there would be grave repercussions.
Despite the political utility of crying wolf, the report writers needed to acknowledge the weaknesses of prior forecasts because they had been disproved by actual trends. Scientists, who had earlier cherry picked the numbers to inflate the potential damage, could not keep on prophesying increases that never arrived.
Perhaps the most embarrassing part of issuing hyperbolic projections, however, was exposed by a few words hidden within the report. Although these were read on television, no one pointed out their implications. They, in fact, made the narrative moot.
Predictions of economic decline, we were told, are valid only as long as we do nothing to cope with the effects of warming. And yet, that we would remain passive in the face of a dire threat is absurd. Of course, we will take action to deal with climatic developments. Moreover, with eighty years to ameliorate the harm, there will be plenty of time to intervene.
According to those who wrote the account, agriculture and tourism are most to be adversely affected. It might not be possible, for example, to grow wheat in Kansas if it got too hot. So why wouldn’t we move the focus of production to a cooler North Dakota?
The same goes for peaches. If they will wither in Georgia, why not grow them in Virginia. This sort of thing has happened before. During the medieval warm period, England was cozy enough to raise grapes. After the climate cooled, the British imported their wine from France and Spain. Soon they may be able to shift the industry back north.
There is also the problem of rising sea levels. Presumably these will inundate coastal cities. But what about the example of the Netherlands? Huge chunks of the Low Countries—including Amsterdam—are below sea level. The Dutch have handled this by building dikes and pumping the water out. Couldn’t we?
As for decreased tourism, aren’t we always constructing new attractions? Las Vegas and Disneyland were once but a gleam in their creator’s eyes. Have we lost our ability to innovate? In fact, as our tastes change, aren’t we likely to demand different forms of entertainment?
To project the world in terms of its current state is a monumental error. The only reason for doing this is to generate support for particular political agendas. Karl Marx imagined that nineteenth century industry would be carried forward indefinitely. The only question was therefore how to divide up the proceeds of a unchanging form of production.
Marx was wrong about his steady-state vision of the future. The world grew far richer than he believed possible. Thanks to unpredicted innovations in efficiency, we increased the size of the economic pie. Will the same thing happen with regard to the challenges thrown up by climate change—if it occurs?
The current projections are just that—projections. Could we have predicted our current way of life during World War I? Why then would we commit our destiny to computer predictions that might never come true?
Melvyn L. Fein, Ph.D.
Professor Emeritus
Kennesaw State University
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