Not a valid point he doesn't.
Depends on whether you understood the points made, or not. Seems you did not understand them.
Good thing noone is doing that then, isn't it? The only optimal temperature is that which has persisted throughout the Holocene, the epoch that spans the entire scope of human civilisation, the only reason it is optimal is because our civilisation evolved to suit those conditions.
You are not really trying to tell us that the climate and temperature was constant and all the same throughout that timespan, do you?
The best you can do is guesstimate what it was during those periods. Simply because we have no real and exact data-logging from those periods.
Anyways, there is no "only optimal temperature". If that would be true, most parts of this globe where people live right now would be devoid of people. Simply because the variations in climate and average temperature on this single globe vary enormously.
Or do you really think that you have the same average climate and temperature in Africa that you have in North Europe?
We change those conditions and the staple crops that have evolved alongside us will no longer grow in the places where we need them to grow.
See, there you are making that mistake. We do not "need to grow" them in any special place at all. At most, we _want_ them to grow there, because it's damn convenient for us. Not because it's the only place where it can grow at all.
The planet will be just fine. Life will continue to prosper. But our species may very well not prosper in greenhouse earth conditions.
So what? The only thing you can be sure of is that we as a species will go extinct. No matter what we do, that will happen. And then, who says that we will not prosper until then? Extrapolating from the current situation into the future, claiming all will be bad if we do nothing, simply based on the fact that things will change is pretty stupid.
Pretty much all things change. Assuming that stuff will remain the same until some point in the future, and than basing a conclusion on that assumption is, well, dishonest at best. Just look what changes of all kinds there have been in the last 200 years. No one 200 years ago could have predicted those changes, let alone judge if they have been for the better or not basing on the current state of affairs back then.
It's got nothing to do with arbitrarily picking a temperature and everything to do with not needlessly altering the climate, which without human intervention can be expected to keep on keeping on with Holocene conditions for the next 15,000 years or so.
Wrong. It has to do with exactly that. It is what they want us to do: Spending bucketloads of money into maintaining or reaching some arbitrarily chosen temperature and/or CO2 levels. No matter how hard some wish to achieve that, the climate will change anyways. Always has, always will.
Who is to judge if such "alterations" are needless? Who is to judge what the outcome of those influences will be exactly? Heck, we can't even really predict the local weather for the next few days. It would be pretentious to claim that we can predict how the climate would be in a few decades or centuries. Just look at all those shiny and pretty models that they made. With all their fancy supercomputers, no less. The only thing that is for sure is that those models are faulty. Otherwise they wouldn't have to correct the extent of temperature change and other stuff downwards all the time.
Yes, we may have an effect on the climate. No, no one can say with certainty what the effects will really be. Simply because we have a sample size of only one. All we can do is speculate and extrapolate, if we really want to. And so far that has lead us to predictions that have to be constantly corrected. Corrected towards the "not as bad as previously thought" end of the scale.
No one can say for certain that the current changes wouldn't have been similar or the same without us. All we have is a correlation. All the attempts to make that into a causation so far have shown to be much less than exact. Otherwise those corrections wouldn't be needed.
And besides all that. What do you think would be the benefit on a few countries spending all that money into preventing any change, making the cost of living much much higher for everyone, while some other country increases it's emissions many times? What good is it if i pay a thousand bucks to "save" a ton of CO2, while some guy in South America will increas his emissions by 5 tons?
What do you want to tell those people? "Hey, look, we released tons and tons of CO2, but we are really friggin wealthy now because of that. And because we are bored, we want you to limit your emissions to save our wealth. No, you can not build up a decent industry. And no, forget about reaching our level industrialization and wealth if it involves releasing some CO2. Your bad luck that you have to catch up. Bye!"
Really?
I stand by it. I think all that money is much better spent on developing strategies to adapt to those changes, instead of putting them into the futile attempt to prevent those changes. Simply because we can not prevent those changes. Too many nations with too many different needs and plans are involved. Unless one can build a global dictatorship that rules over the whole world, there is no chance in hell that any such thing will be successful in the grand scheme of things.
Carlin is quite right when he says that we are unable to really care for ourselves and the ones next to us, but claim to be able to care for the planet.
Make global peace a reality. Have poverty and starving disappear. Remove all the dictators on this planet, and install something resembling democracy in their countries. Make sure that every single person on this planet has enough to eat, gets some decent education, and has a decent standard of living.
Once you achieved that, then we may talk again about caring for our climate. Because unless you achieve that, any attempt to get a "solution" for the "climate problem" worked out and implemented is worse than herding a truckload of fleas. Expensive and futile.
Greetings,
Chris
