I am not at all sympathetic to the thesis that adaptation to climate change is a more practical, feasible or affordable way to deal with anthropogenic global warming than climate mitigation through cutting down fossil fuel use. The problem as I see it is that “adaptation” is precisely what most global warming sceptics, self-interested parties for the most part, want to hear. It takes them off the hook, no amelioration of carbon emissions is required, no thought to our future, don’t bother to look at the figures or best predictions, all these are reduced to an unimportant side show, carry on as we are, we’ll just adapt. But what about the farmers and populations in the immense areas of the world dependent on a reliable supply of summer water from melting glaciers? How do they adapt when the glaciers are gone? What about the populations living in low lying areas, islands or deltas, how do they adapt? What about intensively farmed areas, on which the world population of 6 billion depend for basic foodstuffs, if aridity and heat or salinisation reduce output, how do we all adapt then?

What we have is a degree of climate change already in the pipeline, which we are going to have to adapt to – that’s a given and is unavoidable. What we don’t know is to what degree climate change is in fact going to make further adaptation impossible. If sea levels rise next century by some predications, however good the protection, many of the world’s major cities could be inundated, how do we adapt to that? It seems to me to be pointless even bothering to investigate global warming, if we aren’t going to pay any attention to the messages we are getting. The simple fact is that carbon dioxide may be odourless, colourless, tasteless and transparent, but it is still a pollutant of our atmosphere, to the tune of billions of tons per year. We have no right to pollute the only home we have, and we must stop doing so. Simple really. All other considerations are secondary.

What is particularly galling is that we have the technology to substitute in large measure for fossil fuels, the cost will be nowhere as high as “adapting” to global warming, and it will liberate humanity from the yoke of of an unsustainable economy. The only thing we do lack is the will to pursue this alternative course. Pushing “adaptation” to global warming as a means of dealing with the problem, is like providing sickness benefit and a home, or maybe imprisonment, to a drug addict without making any attempt to get the addict off drugs and back to being a useful member of society – a not inappropriate simile for our world’s addction to fossil fuels.

Adaptation in the original article was discussed largely from a macro perspective – the action of cities and states. This will be essential, of course. But since most pollution (air and otherwise) is from non-point sources, such as homes and cars, the real adaptation benefits must come from waking up the public to the effects of simple everyday behaviours. Here mass education and financial sticks and carrots need to be developed. The result could be both adaptive change and grassroots reduction of the problem, more particularly in developed countries.

I am skeptical of approaches used in various kinds of “War on… (drugs, terrorism, fill the blank)”, but am reminded of the huge drives in WW2(on all sides of the conflict) to collect metals and other materials for recycling and reuse. People in those times sensed the critical urgency and personal contribution called for and responded. There is a need for people to be shown a path out of hopelessness in the face of what is a huge global problem and shown the efficacy of making choices as simple as whether to leave lights on in unused rooms and what car to buy. Of course those of us who are priveledged have far more options in this regard. However, as wealth distribution is not static – witness the growth of (disparate) wealth in India and China, education and incentives can be prudently applied globally.

In short I believe we have to adapt and reduce C, both at macro and micro levels.

It’s not hard for me to conceive that countries like Germany and the US will reduce their emissions by 70% relative to emissions in 2005.

I think that’s a ***probability***………………………..in the 2050 to 2100 time frame.

http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/chronicle/archive/2005/10/02/EDGSHDTUF11.DTL

“Yes, it’s really hard to conceive of getting countries like Germany and the US to reduce their emissions by that 70% (and ultimately more than that)”

How hard will it be to convince India and China to do the same? Especially when many of the environmentalist advocating GW also oppose them damming their rivers for Hydro Power.

>The real problem with the adaptation-only approach is that it ignores the fact that enhanced hurricanes are just one small aspect of the complex of problems resulting from GW.<

What vS and esp. RP have been getting at for some time is that the way we are doing things now is not working.

Crafting yet another brilliant policy fix won’t mean a thing if the public won’t accept it. There is no vision or values tied to this vision for Kyoto-like solutions. Cutting C doesn’t get at the underlying, fundamental way our wasteful society got into this mess in the first place.

vS is NOT saying scientists should become policy advocates. He is saying stop getting bogged down in this fruitless, wasteful battle of GW attribution. These are the terms of the debate that were selected by somebody else, and as such the debate going on forever is the strategy – action means a suboptimal outcome.

The environment as a separate ‘thing’ serves to set the table to devalue that ‘thing’ – the classic subject-object relationship that I prattle on about occasionally.

Adaptation says ‘we are a part of this’, and as such gives responsibility to each to solve the problem.

Best,

D

OTOH, most of the criticism of Baliunas and Soon that I saw, first discussed their methods, noted that they were total crap and speculated that the only reason they wrote the thing was to placate their patrons.

Perhaps our host at some point had a comment on that paper?

The point is… who does the funding means nothing. The work speaks for itself.

Paul Dougherty

Thanks for these several constructive comments. I’d be happy to tersely summarize as you have requested.

1. Scientists should be enagaged in policy and politics, and they have choices, with vastly different consenquences, in how they enagage. they should be aware of these choices and their consequences.

2. It is untenable to claim to a focus only on science when you are seeking to contribute to political and policy debates.

3. Science is critically important to decision making.

4. Groups from all political persuasions politicize science in deleterious ways; to address this issue requires focusing on the underlying conditioning factors, and avoiding politicizing the politicization of science.

5. See above.

There is plenty enough on this site to amply support these statements. I welcome thoughtful debate on these topics, as there is room for plenty of discussion on these complex subjects.

Roger, perhaps rather than claiming that you have not said something (which leaves a lot of ground to cover), it would be best if you could tersely summarize your positions 1-5. In many of those cases, after reading your articles, I though Jonathan was fairly close to the mark.