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Author Archive
The Climate Cocoon
Do your web habits and political leanings make for an online diet that reinforce your biases? Probably not, if you’re a regular reader of this blog. 🙂 Well, actually, such intellectual cocooning is something we all need to watch out for, as I discuss in my latest post for the Yale Forum on Climate Change…Continue Reading…
Climate Debate Needs New Voices
What it doesn’t need is Al Gore, which is kinda the subtext of the quotes from prominent academics and pundits in this USA Today piece by Dan Vergano, who elicits feedback on the recent Climate Reality event. This snippet caught my eye: Gore trying to change public opinion over climate change puts the political cart in front of…Continue Reading…
Peak Fear?
A weekend WSJ excerpt from Daniel Yergin’s highly anticipated new book (published later this week) takes direct aim at the peak oil argument. We’ve heard this song before, Yergin says: This is actually the fifth time in modern history that we’ve seen widespread fear that the world was running out of oil. The first was…Continue Reading…
My Organic Dissonance
If you were to open my refrigerator door, you would see organic eggs, organic milk, organic half and half, organic cheese, organic yogurt, organic lettuce. Organic. Organic. Organic. You get the picture. Truthfully, I never bought into the whole organic foods craze until my kids were born. I’m no health nut. I hide my box…Continue Reading…
Let's Cut to the Chase
This is not rocket science. The Earth is warming; there’s an important human contribution, and it’s something to worry about. This is the scientific consensus. Earth scientists are substantially split only on whether the warming is potentially catastrophic. A nice distillation by John Nielsen-Gammon on where we stand.
Playing Defense is a Losing Strategy
I have a new post up at the Yale Forum on Climate Change & the Media that suggests Vice President Gore and like-minded allies are fighting their battle from a “defensive crouch,” which won’t get them where they want to go. Nor am I the only one wondering if Gore’s recent 24-hour mediathon is the…Continue Reading…
Genetically Modified AG Saves Lives. Imagine That.
Bt cotton now helps to avoid several million cases of pesticide poisoning in India every year, which also entails sizeable health cost savings. This is not the sort of news you’re liable to hear about in anti-GMO quarters, where the concerns of the small farmer are righteously defended.
Blurting Nonsense
Gail Collins writes today in her NYT op-ed that Michelle Bachmann scored a Tea Party version of a home run when she laced into Rick Perry for trying to require girls in Texas public schools to be vaccinated against HPV, a sexually transmitted disease that can cause cervical cancer. A bit further down in her…Continue Reading…
What Was That About?
The climate debate, with all its rivalries, melodramatic clashes, and endless reprisals, often resembles a modern-day