Talk-Polywell.org

"On global warming, conservative policy positions often seem to be conflated or confused with rejection of the consensus that the planet has been warming due to human carbon emissions. The climate trend over the last several hundred years is not one anybody credible disputes—despite the impression you might get from GOP presidential primary debates. Of the many Republican members of Congress I know personally, the vast majority do not reject the underlying science of global warming (though, embarrassingly, some still do). Even Senator Jim Inhofe, perhaps the green community’s greatest antagonist in Congress, explicitly endorses environmental regulation.

The catch: Conservatives believe many of the policies put forward to address the problem will lead to unacceptable levels of economic hardship. It's not inherently anti-scientific to oppose cap and trade or carbon taxes. What most Republicans object to are policies that unilaterally make it more expensive in the United States to produce energy, grow food, and transport people and goods but are unlikely to make much long-term difference in the world’s climate, given that other major world economies emit more carbon than the United States or have much faster growth rates of carbon emissions (China, India, Russia, and Brazil all come to mind).

The more important question on climate change is not “how do we eliminate carbon immediately?” but “how best do we secure a cleaner environment and more prosperous world for future generations?”"

It is on this subject that many on the political left deeply hold some serious anti-scientific beliefs. Set aside the fact that twice as many Democrats as Republicans believe in astrology, a pseudoscientific medieval farce. Left-wing ideologues also frequently espouse an irrational fear of nuclear power, genetic modification, and industrial and agricultural chemistry—even though all of these scientific breakthroughs have enriched lives, lengthened lifespans, and produced substantial economic growth over the last century.

Examining greenhouse-gas emissions in exact terms, three of our biggest sources of emissions are electricity generation, transportation, and agriculture. With widespread adoption of nuclear technology, we could conceivably cut out more than 70 percent of our total emissions by eliminating the pollution from burning petroleum for transportation and coal for electricity generation (Nobel Prize-winning physicist Burton Richter explains this in his slightly technical but readable Beyond Smoke and Mirrors).

One result of caricaturing the GOP as the “bad guys” is that the Obama and the Democrats get a free pass on bad decisions that undermine long-term basic research.

Nuclear power is the only energy source that can actually meet base-load power requirements for a cost competitive KW/h price with almost zero carbon emissions. One of the largest hurdles to nuclear energy is storage of byproduct waste, something Obama dealt a huge blow when he halted the development of Yucca Mountain for what the Government Accountability Office called strictly political reasons. Republicans in Congress have repeatedly supported moving forward with Yucca Mountain.

As for agricultural emissions, the purpose of GMOs is to use less area, less energy, less pesticide, and less maintenance than conventional crops. They also mean we can grow food in new areas around the globe. With the tools to feed the world with viable crops closer to the poles, we can preserve the more biodiverse regions close to the equatorial zones.

Stewart Brand, the 1960s environmental activist, has bemoaned opposition to genetically modified organisms as “irrational, anti-scientific, and very harmful.” The anti-GMO movement, largely a product of the political left, has reached levels of delusion, paranoia and anti-intellectualism worthy of Michele Bachmann and young-earth creationists.

choff wrote:The big critique I hear about GMO is that they're trying to monopolize the seeds, if the wind blows theirs over to the non GMO farm they sue the non GMO farmer. In essence, the GMO companies want a patent on life itself, the ability to grow food. Just try growing some types of seed potatoes or keep a chicken for eggs on your property and watch the regulatory fun begin.

choff wrote:With the chickens it's also a bird flu worry, but there are other critiques of GMO, one being it's over rated compared to traditional seeds, or it produces one good crop exhausting the soil before bankrupting the farmer.

choff wrote:The big critique I hear about GMO is that they're trying to monopolize the seeds, if the wind blows theirs over to the non GMO farm they sue the non GMO farmer.