When University of Edinburgh graduate student Claire Leppold attended a lecture on the aftermath of the Fukushima Daichi nuclear accident, caused by the massive earthquake and tsunami in 2011, she expected to learn about high cancer and birth defect rates because of exposure to high radiation levels. She wrote that what she learned shocked her: I knew there had been a nuclear accident in Fukushima. I assumed this had led to dangerous radiation levels and increases in cancers. I had never … [Read more...]
Dogs—Mankind’s Best Friend?
Readers of my posts know that nature is dangerous. Radical environmentalists who constantly assert that humanity’s relationship with nature would be fine if we would just “work in harmony” is idealistic nonsense to those with jobs in the outdoors. Nature is safe when it is subjected to human service. Consider dogs, domesticated hundreds of years ago, they are now a big part of the lives of many people. But their submissive behavior is often misunderstood as “love.” It doesn’t take long for … [Read more...]
A Gorilla, A Boy, and the Decline of Human Dignity
On May 29, 2016, a 3 or 4 year-old boy (sources differ on his age) was visiting the Cincinnati Zoo with his mother. As boys sometimes do, he got into trouble. In this case big trouble, life threatening trouble. He fell into the enclosure that housed a 450 pound male silverback gorilla named Harambe (for the meaning of Harambe click here). It’s amazing the child survived the 10-foot fall into the enclosure. The water in the enclosure’s moat must have broken his fall. The danger was not over … [Read more...]
“Social Cost of Carbon”—Going, Going, Gone?
The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency forecasts the "social cost of carbon" (SCC) in the year 2020 to run anywhere from $13 to $137 per metric ton. That's EPA's measure of the harm each ton of "carbon" (really carbon dioxide, but who cares with our ill-educated public that doesn't know the difference between an element and a compound---especially when the shorthand serves the purpose of scaring people needlessly?) emitted into the atmosphere. Its estimates are based on a … [Read more...]
Zika vs. Global Warming—What’s Obama’s Priority?
According to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control, the number of cases of the Zika virus in the U.S. has grown from 107 in February to 618 as of June 1. The virus has people all over the world scared. Though it poses little threat to healthy adults, babies in the wombs of infected mothers can suffer catastrophic birth defects. So of course President Barack Obama is asking Congress for $1.8 billion to fight it. But just how serious is he about it? Well, Congress last December gave the … [Read more...]
Three Cheers for Hunger?
The Smithsonian.com, a reliable cheerleader for global warming alarmism, published a celebratory article yesterday reporting that carbon dioxide injected into the earth in Iceland turned into rock, promising to offset global warming from CO2 emissions. But while continuing research keeps reducing the amount of warming estimated to eventuate from CO2 emissions, other continuing research confirms again and again that adding CO2 to the atmosphere does wonders for plants---and everything that … [Read more...]
Open Letter to Attorneys General about Climate Change
Dear Attorneys General, You’re not stupid. Stupid people don’t graduate from law school. Neither are you generally ignorant. You know lots of law. But the day of the “Renaissance man,” vastly learned across all fields of knowledge, is long gone. All intelligent and learned people are ignorant about some things. So, U.S. Attorney General Loretta Lynch and members of Attorneys General United for Clean Power, take no offense when I tell you that your intent to investigate and … [Read more...]
Morality-Based Veganism and Cultural Bigotry
Several years ago, I was outside Denver Colorado and noticed a billboard that said, "Why love one and eat the other?" An analogous sign can be found at Mercy for Animals. It shows a picture of a dog and a pig, with the question, why love one and eat the other? It is an ingenious marketing ploy. Exploit the American public’s idolatrous view of their pets in an attempt to exploit their view of fair play and adopt a meatless diet. [NBC New reports 7/12/2015 that Americans will spend more than 60 … [Read more...]
Is Sea Level Rise Accelerating—or Approaching a Tipping Point?
As medium-term global average atmospheric temperature trends continue to diverge sharply from predictions based on global warming alarmists' hypotheses about CO2's warming effect, climate feedbacks, and computer models expressing those hypotheses, the alarmists have increasingly turned to other reasons for pursuing the economic (especially energy) policies they prefer: "weather weirding," "extreme weather," ocean "acidification," "coral bleaching," species extinction, and particularly … [Read more...]
What’s the Problem with the Commons—in Environment and Health Care?
For generations economists have recognized the "problem of the commons." The phrase harks back to when villagers all shared a common pasture. The natural incentive for each villager was to graze as many livestock on it as he could, because if instead he restricted his herd so the demand on the pasture's grass growth was sustainable, his neighbors would run more livestock, the commons would still be exhausted, and he'd be left behind. When instead each person must own the land on which he grazed … [Read more...]
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