I think that the Earth will get warmer in the same way that I think exercise is good for longevity. I’m not competent to evaluate the arguments or even evaluate the people who evaluate the arguments, but there seems to be enough evidence from different sources to make me reasonably confident.
I have no idea what climate change’s impact will be on people. Are current global temperatures optimized for human welfare? Probably not. Will making temperatures warmer be an overall gain or loss to human welfare? I have no clue. Is the cheapest way to avoid harms reducing CO2 emissions, or building levees, or moving everyone 10 miles inland, or putting mirrors in the stratosphere, or something else? Again, no clue.
I am encouraged that people are taking the welfare of humans hundreds of years in the future seriously. I am discouraged that the discussion on climate change is dominated by if it real, not what will its effects be and how can we optimize the upside and minimize the downside.
Are current global temperatures optimized for human welfare?
It does seem extremely unlikely that global temperatures are optimized for human welfare, but not as hard to believe that human welfare is optimized for current global temperatures.
Why? Most of human evolution happened when it was colder than today, whereas much of human agricultural civilization happened when it was warmer (1, 2).
Is there a reason why you’re limiting yourself to evolutionary innovations that occurred after human speciation? Most of our thermoregulation techniques are at least as old as the Triassic, which was much warmer.
Conversely, less elaborate adaptations can happen very quickly. The pale skin of Europeans seems to have originated after the end of the last ice age, for example.
It’s also worth pointing out that our species seems to have been basically regional until about 60,000 years ago. So even if we limit ourselves to the last 200,000 years of adaptation, we should calibrate those expectations based on the African regional temperatures rather than a global average. Humans living in New England today may well be experiencing colder temperatures than their ice age ancestors.
It’s likely that a disproportionate account of optimization of human welfare has occurred in the last few centuries. Moreover people are mobile and the variation in temperatures over the surface of the earth is greater than over a few thousand years. So humans are likely to have optimized their location to approximately optimize their welfare.
So humans are likely to have optimized their location to approximately optimize their welfare.
This is VERY technology-dependent.
Only a hundred years ago southern Florida was considered not a fit place for people to live in, being, basically, a swamp infested by alligators and malaria mosquitoes.
If the shifts cost a few billion dollars, that likely would hard to measure. So I guess the question is what rises to “real” ill effects, and what is “ludicrously massive”. I think most people would consider the shift in population from Africa to America during the seventeenth and eighteenth century to have involved significant real ill effect, and that involved only a small fraction of the global population.
The ill effect had very little to do with the shipping, and a whole lot to do with what was done with the people who were shipped. If the sugar plantations had been in Sierra Leone, it wouldn’t have been any more humane.
Are current global temperatures optimized for human welfare?
A lot of systems are optimized for current temperatures, including: ecosystems, agriculture, the economy, coastal habitations, etc. - and degradation of those system is bad for human welfare; they would eventually be re-balanced, but at a cost.
(Yes this is a fully general argument in favor of the climatic status quo)
I agree that it’s an argument that can be used in favor of status quo in a lot of situations (it’s similar to Chesterton’s Fence), but it won’t apply as strongly; the argument mostly requires that changing the status quo disrupts system that:
Impact human welfare a lot, and
Are slow to re-stabilize
… so a good argument can be made that climate does that, but the effect is less strong for national politics, and even less strong for things like corporate policies, roles inside a family, etc.
it’s an argument that can be used in favor of status quo in a lot of situations..., but it won’t apply as strongly
Why not?
Example: Russia. The collapse of the USSR both impacted human welfare a lot and the society was slow to re-stablize. Or how about independence wars or revolutions in general?
The problem with your argument in meta terms is that it discounts the long-term utility too much in comparison with the short-term utility.
Or how about independence wars or revolutions in general?
You mean, those things that almost always increase human misery and fail to accomplish their objectives? Aside from the Americans, whose revolution was fundamentally very conservative(it was based on the rights of Englishmen as understood in the time of their grandfathers more than anything), revolutions are notoriously bad ideas.
It’s an effect that should be taken into account in a broad array of situations. Emile didn’t say that it was an overwhelmingly powerful argument in all situations, nor did she come a little bit close to implying it.
This actually looks like a fully general argument if favor of any status quo.
This makes no sense as a criticism unless you think it’s claimed to be very powerful. If it can be weak, then sure, it’s a fully general argument in favor of any status quo, and that’s A-OK, and it’s fairly obviously A-OK, so what are you complaining about?
(this was edited to completely replace its contents)
I think that the Earth will get warmer in the same way that I think exercise is good for longevity. I’m not competent to evaluate the arguments or even evaluate the people who evaluate the arguments, but there seems to be enough evidence from different sources to make me reasonably confident.
I have no idea what climate change’s impact will be on people. Are current global temperatures optimized for human welfare? Probably not. Will making temperatures warmer be an overall gain or loss to human welfare? I have no clue. Is the cheapest way to avoid harms reducing CO2 emissions, or building levees, or moving everyone 10 miles inland, or putting mirrors in the stratosphere, or something else? Again, no clue.
I am encouraged that people are taking the welfare of humans hundreds of years in the future seriously. I am discouraged that the discussion on climate change is dominated by if it real, not what will its effects be and how can we optimize the upside and minimize the downside.
It does seem extremely unlikely that global temperatures are optimized for human welfare, but not as hard to believe that human welfare is optimized for current global temperatures.
Why? Most of human evolution happened when it was colder than today, whereas much of human agricultural civilization happened when it was warmer (1, 2).
Is there a reason why you’re limiting yourself to evolutionary innovations that occurred after human speciation? Most of our thermoregulation techniques are at least as old as the Triassic, which was much warmer.
Conversely, less elaborate adaptations can happen very quickly. The pale skin of Europeans seems to have originated after the end of the last ice age, for example.
It’s also worth pointing out that our species seems to have been basically regional until about 60,000 years ago. So even if we limit ourselves to the last 200,000 years of adaptation, we should calibrate those expectations based on the African regional temperatures rather than a global average. Humans living in New England today may well be experiencing colder temperatures than their ice age ancestors.
It’s likely that a disproportionate account of optimization of human welfare has occurred in the last few centuries. Moreover people are mobile and the variation in temperatures over the surface of the earth is greater than over a few thousand years. So humans are likely to have optimized their location to approximately optimize their welfare.
This is VERY technology-dependent.
Only a hundred years ago southern Florida was considered not a fit place for people to live in, being, basically, a swamp infested by alligators and malaria mosquitoes.
Population shifts in the last century have been ludicrously massive, with no real ill effect. If there’s climatological reason, we can do so again.
If the shifts cost a few billion dollars, that likely would hard to measure. So I guess the question is what rises to “real” ill effects, and what is “ludicrously massive”. I think most people would consider the shift in population from Africa to America during the seventeenth and eighteenth century to have involved significant real ill effect, and that involved only a small fraction of the global population.
The ill effect had very little to do with the shipping, and a whole lot to do with what was done with the people who were shipped. If the sugar plantations had been in Sierra Leone, it wouldn’t have been any more humane.
A lot of systems are optimized for current temperatures, including: ecosystems, agriculture, the economy, coastal habitations, etc. - and degradation of those system is bad for human welfare; they would eventually be re-balanced, but at a cost.
(Yes this is a fully general argument in favor of the climatic status quo)
This actually looks like a fully general argument if favor of any status quo.
Are you saying my argument proves too much?
I agree that it’s an argument that can be used in favor of status quo in a lot of situations (it’s similar to Chesterton’s Fence), but it won’t apply as strongly; the argument mostly requires that changing the status quo disrupts system that:
Impact human welfare a lot, and
Are slow to re-stabilize
… so a good argument can be made that climate does that, but the effect is less strong for national politics, and even less strong for things like corporate policies, roles inside a family, etc.
I am saying its overly broad.
Why not?
Example: Russia. The collapse of the USSR both impacted human welfare a lot and the society was slow to re-stablize. Or how about independence wars or revolutions in general?
The problem with your argument in meta terms is that it discounts the long-term utility too much in comparison with the short-term utility.
You mean, those things that almost always increase human misery and fail to accomplish their objectives? Aside from the Americans, whose revolution was fundamentally very conservative(it was based on the rights of Englishmen as understood in the time of their grandfathers more than anything), revolutions are notoriously bad ideas.
Those things which move history forward in bloody spurts and zigzags, yes.
It’s an effect that should be taken into account in a broad array of situations. Emile didn’t say that it was an overwhelmingly powerful argument in all situations, nor did she come a little bit close to implying it.
...and nor did I criticize it for that.
So where did this whole idea come from?
This makes no sense as a criticism unless you think it’s claimed to be very powerful. If it can be weak, then sure, it’s a fully general argument in favor of any status quo, and that’s A-OK, and it’s fairly obviously A-OK, so what are you complaining about?
(this was edited to completely replace its contents)