Would you ask the carbon fairy to wave her wand or not?
A recent edition of BBC Radio 4’s "Analysis" program started with a interesting angle on the carbon emission / global warming angle: [quote]
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""ROWLATT: A couple of years ago I was given a very
unusual job. I became the BBC’s Ethical Man. My
family and I were asked to spend an entire year
exploring what we could do to tackle global
warming. We gave up the car, stopped flying for a
year, turned down the thermostat - everything we
could think of to cut our carbon emissions. Because I
thought that was what tackling global warming was
all about. But the more time I’ve spent talking to
people in the green movement, the more I’ve come to
suspect that cutting carbon emissions isn’t the top
priority for all green campaigners. What worries me
is that the political objectives of some greens seem to
override their interest in solving global warming.
Solitaire Townsend runs a city PR firm, but one
which specialises in communicating a single issue:
sustainability.
TOWNSEND: I was making a speech to nearly 200
really hard core, deep environmentalists and I played
a little thought game on them. I said imagine I am the
carbon fairy and I wave a magic wand. We can get rid
of all the carbon in the atmosphere, take it down to
two hundred fifty parts per million and I will ensure
with my little magic wand that we do not go above
two degrees of global warming. However, by waving
my magic wand I will be interfering with the laws of
physics not with people – they will be as selfish, they
will be as desiring of status. The cars will get bigger,
the houses will get bigger, the planes will fly all over
the place but there will be no climate change. And I
asked them, would you ask the fairy to wave its
magic wand? And about 2 people of the 200 raised
their hands.
ROWLATT: That is quite shocking. I bet you were
shocked, weren’t you?
TOWNSEND: I was angry. I wasn’t shocked. I was
angry because it really showed that they wanted
more. They didn’t just want to prevent climate
change. They wanted to somehow change people, or
at very least for people to know that they had to
change.""
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So, what would YOU wish for? Ask the carbon fairy to wave her wand or keep going with the religion?
http://news.bbc.co.uk/nol/shared/spl/hi/programmes/analysis/transcripts/25_01_10.txt
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EDIT @ Paul B -
You really shouldn’t throw out phrases like "strawman argument" when you clearly have no idea what they actually mean.
A "strawman" argument is when you falsely misrepresent someone else’s position and then proceed to attack that misrepresented position instead of the real argument.
In the quote above there is no other argument being made as it is presented as a hypothetical or counter-factual thought-experiment to explore what really motivates people.
Don’t you have a village missing you at the moment?
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Paul, it’s a thought game, there is no debating it, I’m going to wave my wand and make the atmosphere as perfect as it use to be back in the day before CO2 started destroying the earth, hehe…
The question is would you accept this benevolent gift to solve the problem or would you turn it down because you feel it won’t solve the problem. If scientist came up with a way to suck CO2 out of the air at a super cheap and effective way and we could bring CO2 levels to any level we wanted would you be satisfied that AGW was solved?
Either you are subconsioucly parroting Townsends conclusion or you really feel the problem isn’t CO2 but people that need to be fixed as he suggest.
February 9th, 2010 at 5:34 am
I worked in Washington as an aide on the House Energy and Commerce committee for the better part of a decade, and I don’t find this the least bit surprising. You’d have to be an absolute drooling idiot not to notice the militant misanthropy of the Malthusians/environmentalists. THEY DON’T GIVE A DAMN ABOUT THE SO-CALLED "ENVIRONMENT." All - ALL - they care about is reducing the standard of living of the average person. That’s it. They’re just pro-oligarchy austerity freaks, period.
The radical Malthusians have all jumped on board with the global warming scam because they sense it’s a good opportunity for them to bamboozle the public into accepting their depraved policies. That’s all it is - oh sure, there are plenty of true believers out there, but I chalk that up to the enormous capacity for self-deception which exists in most humans.
Bottom line - these people are truly sick, and they pose a very dire threat to society. They should all be institutionalized for their clinical misanthropic psychopathy.
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February 9th, 2010 at 5:52 am
They don’t want to solve the (non-existent) Problem
They want to punish the consumers!
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February 9th, 2010 at 6:32 am
This must be the silliest straw man argument yet. Plus ad hominem and guilt by undefined association. We’re not even told who he was talking to. But to treat the Q more seriously than it deserves
|o:)
I would have kept my hand down because I wasn’t going to be so silly as to vote for a physical impossibility.
I would also have probably thought, just listening to this drivel without the chance to go back over it word for word, that with the bigger cars etc we would be back where we started anyway.
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February 9th, 2010 at 7:07 am
Paul, it’s a thought game, there is no debating it, I’m going to wave my wand and make the atmosphere as perfect as it use to be back in the day before CO2 started destroying the earth, hehe…
The question is would you accept this benevolent gift to solve the problem or would you turn it down because you feel it won’t solve the problem. If scientist came up with a way to suck CO2 out of the air at a super cheap and effective way and we could bring CO2 levels to any level we wanted would you be satisfied that AGW was solved?
Either you are subconsioucly parroting Townsends conclusion or you really feel the problem isn’t CO2 but people that need to be fixed as he suggest.
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February 9th, 2010 at 7:47 am
No, I will not ask Carbon Fairy to wave her wand….what for? people will never listen anyway, why she must waste her energy?….Let it be….look at the country where I am now….many people especially from the government, they at least own 10 cars each, and they have 370 members in those sick office, …you know…each car for each child, a car also for nanny, maids, wives (I say wives, not wife/Muslim are allowed to have more than 1 wife), etc..etc….so? Can you count how many cars they have in there at the same time at the same hours?…Jesus Christ !!….Let that cute Carbon Fairy take a break!!
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February 9th, 2010 at 7:58 am
just another indicator that global warming is simply the latest tool some people are trying to use to impose their will on as many other people as possible.
the perpetrator’s don’t want any Solutions. they just want to tell everyone how to live, exactly the same motive as with any other religion.
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February 9th, 2010 at 8:44 am
The Global Warming movement is a neo-nazi political movement hidden in an environmentalist agenda. Hater groups hang out on websites like ecohuddle and discuss who they hate the most. (true) and they discuss the things they want to take away from others. Sites like these should be shut down.
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February 9th, 2010 at 9:04 am
Dr. Jello: <<The Global Warming movement is a neo-nazi political movement hidden in an environmentalist agenda. Hater groups hang out on websites like ecohuddle and discuss who they hate the most. (true) and they discuss the things they want to take away from others. Sites like these should be shut down>>
Clearly Dr. Jello is a mental case.
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