On 19/05/2021 16:57, GB wrote:
On 19/05/2021 16:18, Tim Streater wrote:

If the alternative is climate catastrophe, then I'm prepared to stop
occasionally.

How d'ye know that's the alternative?

Let's do a risk analysis:

Suppose all the scientists concerned about climate catastrophe are
wrong, then you'll be suffering a little inconvenience unnecessarily.
That's not the end of the world.


But that is not te true case




Suppose all the scientists concerned about climate catastrophe are
right, but we refuse to suffer a little inconvenience. That is the end
of the world.

But that is not te true case


I don't feel that I need to know for certain that the climate
catastrophe hypothesis is correct. It's just not fair to future
generations to risk it.

That is because you are starting from two utterly false premises.
1. That climate change is supported by a large number of *scientists*
2. that the current measures to combat it are effective and will result
in *just a little inconvenience.

First of all the number of scientists who are both involved in real
climate science, and who believe it is as dangerous as the Great
Thunderbox says it is, is zero.

There are half dozen or so fighting to save their careers who still
claim that it is, but they don't *believe* it, either. They are caught
in a lie that they cannot retract.

Climate change has completely separated itself from science. All the
science points to the fact that the models are not producing anything
like the correct results, and the assumptions on which the models are
based are therefore at best incomplete, or at worst downright wrong.

the second assumption, that it merely is going to cost us a few pence on
our electricity bills or a few extra stops on the way to Bangor, is
ultimately horse**** as well.

Every reasonable study that has addressed the cost of going zero carbon
has found that its a trillion dollar exercise that will achieve almost
nothing.

The cost of adjusting to what little climate change we have had or will
likely have, is far far less.

In fact climate change may itself save money as there are signs that a
slightly warmer high CO2 atmosphere is very beneficial to crops.

The real danger of climate change is an ill considered rush that will in
any case fail to meet a challenge that doesn't exist except in peoples
minds.

However having said all that, the challenges of adapting to a low fossil
fuel civilisation are real, and do need to be met. Not because
ClimateChange, but cecause EROEI. Fossil fuels are not in the limit
sustainable. Nor is 'Renewable Energy'.

Which leaves us with really just one viable primary energy source.
Nuclear power.

The challenge is how to turn that into a mobile off grid power source.

My best guess is not batteries, its synthetic hydrocarbon fuel


--
When plunder becomes a way of life for a group of men in a society, over
the course of time they create for themselves a legal system that
authorizes it and a moral code that glorifies it.

Frédéric Bastiat