No need to sway on global warming

People keep sending me stuff for and against to influence what I write in the book.

Here's the deal: in my mind the dynamic "for" or "against" is superseded by a number of elements in the future.

Meaning, I'm beyond caring about that data.

Comments

[VoteWithTroops]

Your neutrality on the issue is only logical.

Historical data over millenia and future climate change will prove that 1) pollution is bad 2) green house gases cause global cooling not global warming and 3) man made global warming is the political hoax of the century. Why has NASA called 1998 (recently revised to 1934) the warmest year on record? Why is global temperature not continuing to rise in pace with increased energy usage (since 1998 or 1934)?

Your neutrality on the issue is only logical.

[dipaolom]

I infer that being "beyond caring about that data" is intended to mean that whether or not the earth is warming, our strategic future will be shaped by people acting on their belief that the earth is warming. But isn't that intellectual foundation exactly the opposite of taking a strategic perspective?

The facts always win (sometimes it takes a while, but a grand strategist doesn't need to spend his time waiting--he can think and speak in context of that eventuality while everyone else is panicking, investing in tulip bulbs, quitting thier jobs to be day-traders, demonstrating against globalization, providing angel financing to zero-revenue dot coms, flipping real-estate financed by interest-only variable rate loans, etc.).

Great article on the subject HERE. Best quote: "The delusion that by recycling and catching public transport we can help save the planet will quickly come to be seen for the childish nonsense it was all along. The poorest Indians and Chinese will be left in peace to work their way towards prosperity, without being badgered about the size of their carbon footprint..."

It will just take time. I have learned to think in context of that eventuality in Tom's books and here at his blog.

[Tom Barnett]

No and yes, dipaolom.

I am arguing that the sum total effect of going from 6.5B people to 9.x by 2050 and roughly tripling the global middle class (at least) in the next dozen years alone will set in motion a consumption curve that will force the same changes in energy and food and a host of other issue-areas that "pro" global warming advocates would argue for. I don't need the causality analysis. The demand curve is enough. Raising the temperature a bit or a lot isn't the big driver here. We're fretting over symptoms.

In all of this, I remain supremely optimistic concerning human ingenuity. Plus, it's good to shift our manias. Terrorism and extremism have proven poor sources for grand strategic thinking.