Wednesday, July 25, 2012

Climate Deniers Deny Law of Supply and Demand

The recent spate of bad climate news has of course been hotly debated in the comments sections of many a site.  For my own part, I'm seeing a form of climate denialism that I guess shouldn't surprise me, but still somehow does; deniers actually mocking the idea that a carbon price could reduce carbon emissions.

We're now at the point where right wingers (as almost all deniers are) are so mixed up that they're actually arguing that government making some economic activity more expensive will not have any impact on the amount of that activity that takes place.   It's hard to say for sure, deniers are generally something between incoherent, incohate and incomprehensible, but despite my initial surprise, I really can't muster much shock at seeing conservatives debate against supply and demand itself.  That is what you're saying when you take the position that a carbon pricing mechanism will reduce the climate problem, which can only make sense if you're saying that it won't reduce emissions.

It has typically taken the form of comments reacting to news like the above stories about heat waves, droughts and surprising ice melts that don't address the substance of the news, but simply say "Don't worry everyone, the econuts will fix it all with a giant global tax!  Har har, because taxes will really fix everything!" or "Well if we all pay Al Gore lots of money, I hear glowbull warming will go away."  You'll also see them on cap and trade say "businesses will simply pass these costs onto consumers" as if those businesses won't feel any incentive to try and reduce their operating emissions in order to find a competitive advantage over their peers.  It's very strange.

Admittedly I am so far only seeing this directly from wingnut commenters, but it's frequent and palpable and it of course comes from somewhere in the denialosphere.  When I went looking, I do find the Weather Network's Denier-In-Chief is giving a tirade against California putting a price on carbon (via Watts), however he's making the more usual denialist "It's unnecessary because climate change isn't a problem" style argument. 

My optimistic hopeful spin on tihs is that we're seeing an inflection point, where even deniers are increasingly distressed at what they're seeing, and instead of making the usual denialist arguments about the various weather phenomena, they jump right to "well whatever the problem is, putting a tax on carbon won't fix it."  It's a tacit admission that there is a problem to be solved, and we've switched from arguing about the problem to debating possible solutions. There's still plenty of the regular forms of denial, I'm not saying they've given up, but maybe I'm seeing something worth mentioning.  I can't find any recent polling on climate for the US, hopefully a good one comes out soon.

4 comments:

  1. "deniers actually mocking the idea that a carbon price could reduce carbon emissions."

    I have never heard deniers say this but ok. I agree with you, putting a price on carbon will definately reduce economic activity, thereby reducing carbon emissions. Like the present recession has reduced economic activity which has reduced carbon emissions to below 2005 levels, and it happened without the haloed cap&trade scam...sniff...

    And I also hope a good poll come out too, but not soon. Polls conducted in the summer usually show people are worried about the climate. Polls conducted in winter usually show people are NOT worried about climate. So I would rather a good poll be done in winter. But it has nothing to do with the seasons, no. Nothing at all. Lol!

    cheers

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    1. Oh your ju-jitsu is so powerful. Yes, carbon taxation will ruin the economy, unlike rampant floods, hurricanes, droughts and heat waves which are good for the economy.

      It always entertains me to see people happily being fleeced by frauds like Viscount Monckton call measures to mitigate the climate crisis a "scam." Your movement treats a guy who lies about being a member of the British House of Lords and claimed to have cured Graves' disease like a venerable expert. You wouldn't recognize a real scam if you ran into Bernie Madoff playing 3-card monte on a street corner.

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  2. "..rampant floods, hurricanes, droughts and heat waves which are good for the economy."

    This is true, major disasters contribute to the nations GDP.

    We climate deniers understand, that floods, hurricanes, droughts and heat waves are merely evidence of normal climate vaariability only, they are not evidence that co2 is the cause.

    And it always entertains me to see people happily being fleeced by frauds like Al Gore and yourself who refer to normal climate variability as a 'crisis'.

    yes, my ju-jitsu is better than yours.

    cheers

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    1. Where is your evidence that these things are the consequences of "natural" climate variability? Natural climate events have causes too. Something is making the earth hotter, if not humans, what?

      You call yourselves "skeptics" and demand evidence for humans warming the planet, deny the evidence presented and then believe an evidence free theory about "natural" variability. What is causing the warming? Sunspots? Volcanoes? Cosmic rays? Did 50,000 year Milankovitch cycles warm the planet 0.8C in 50 years?

      Really, wouldn't it just be easier to accept reality? All of the supposed natural causes have been examined in detail and none support the evidence. It's magical, wishful thinking.

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