Al Gore and Technological Progress
In his book "Earth in the Balance," Al Gore wrote that the people who were denying the global warming in 1980s were going to be penitent later for what they had done.
He made an error common to humanitarians: Of overestimatingpeople's character.
As it stands, these people are not only not penitent but are aggressively denying reality of global warming even as we speak.
And they havebeen maliciously attacking not only Al Gore, but also science itself, to which they owe their entire lifestyle, from TVs to computers to trucks and cars to phones to supermarkets; to which business owes everything that it sells; and without which capitalism would be nothing more than exchange of most basic commodities as it was in medieval Persia.
There are people who continue equating oil and dirty coal with progress.
They are practicing a Big Lie.
Oil and dirty coal are no more progress now than horse and buggy was in the beginning of 20th century.
True progress means moving to better technologies - smarter technologies - technologies that maximize utility and minimize destruction and waste.
And that means, moving from oil and dirty coal to better technologies such as the Hydrogen Transmission Network.
The stance of the oilman is in no way the stance of progress; it is the stance of the Luddite who wants to do away with progress because he thinks that with progress he will not have his job.
Technological progress in early 20th century did not result invast loss of life and property as is predicted by anti-clean-energy people; it resulted in vast growth in prosperity and jobs.
The exact same stands to beexpected of conversion to clean energy.
Capitalism, like all things human, can be done in any number of ways and carries potentials for all sorts of outcomes.
There is a shortfall in present definition of capitalism: It fails to compute environmental costs.
And this is responsible for the worst features in capitalism: Its failure to be incentivized away from blind, stupid, destructive practices such as burning the rainforest - and toward prudent, intelligent, practices that build upon innovation and ingenuity to maximize utility for people while minimizing destruction of what people have not created and cannot conceivably recreate.
No, it is not intelligent, nor is it right, to burn down rich, essential environments such as the Amazonian rainforest to build ranches that will become useless in two years.
No, it is not intelligent, nor is it right, to leech gold out of mountains with mercury and kill the people who live downstream.
No, it is not right to spew out vast amounts of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere so that it accumulates in the middle atmosphere to create an environmental crisis and goes into the ocean to kill all the fish.
Humanity is smarter than that; and humanity can and should do better.
Far be it from me to advocate going away from technology or economics.
Ratherreal progress must be embraced to move away from destructive technologies tobetter technologies.
And economic activity must be done in such a way as tomaximize ingenuity, intelligence and utility to the consumer while minimizingstupidity, destructiveness and blindness that destroys what one has not createdand can't recreate to arrive at utility minimal to null.
Clean energy is progress, and anyone who claims to believe in progress has a logical duty to embrace clean energy.
The anti-clean-energy stance is the stance of the Luddites.
As for the claims that clean energy is "anti-human" - humanbeing is not defined as "the being that burns oil.
" Far more essential to human advancement has been innovation, intelligence and ingenuity; and that meansprogress toward better technologies - progress in the energy sector as much asin all others.
The truly rational, human, progress-oriented stance is therefore an enthusiastic embrace of clean energy and its widespread implementation.
It is this that will move the economy out of the doldrums and into real economic growth.
And it will also minimize blind destructiveness and short-sightedness, preserving what people have not created and aren't capable of re-creating while maximizing utility and economic growth.
He made an error common to humanitarians: Of overestimatingpeople's character.
As it stands, these people are not only not penitent but are aggressively denying reality of global warming even as we speak.
And they havebeen maliciously attacking not only Al Gore, but also science itself, to which they owe their entire lifestyle, from TVs to computers to trucks and cars to phones to supermarkets; to which business owes everything that it sells; and without which capitalism would be nothing more than exchange of most basic commodities as it was in medieval Persia.
There are people who continue equating oil and dirty coal with progress.
They are practicing a Big Lie.
Oil and dirty coal are no more progress now than horse and buggy was in the beginning of 20th century.
True progress means moving to better technologies - smarter technologies - technologies that maximize utility and minimize destruction and waste.
And that means, moving from oil and dirty coal to better technologies such as the Hydrogen Transmission Network.
The stance of the oilman is in no way the stance of progress; it is the stance of the Luddite who wants to do away with progress because he thinks that with progress he will not have his job.
Technological progress in early 20th century did not result invast loss of life and property as is predicted by anti-clean-energy people; it resulted in vast growth in prosperity and jobs.
The exact same stands to beexpected of conversion to clean energy.
Capitalism, like all things human, can be done in any number of ways and carries potentials for all sorts of outcomes.
There is a shortfall in present definition of capitalism: It fails to compute environmental costs.
And this is responsible for the worst features in capitalism: Its failure to be incentivized away from blind, stupid, destructive practices such as burning the rainforest - and toward prudent, intelligent, practices that build upon innovation and ingenuity to maximize utility for people while minimizing destruction of what people have not created and cannot conceivably recreate.
No, it is not intelligent, nor is it right, to burn down rich, essential environments such as the Amazonian rainforest to build ranches that will become useless in two years.
No, it is not intelligent, nor is it right, to leech gold out of mountains with mercury and kill the people who live downstream.
No, it is not right to spew out vast amounts of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere so that it accumulates in the middle atmosphere to create an environmental crisis and goes into the ocean to kill all the fish.
Humanity is smarter than that; and humanity can and should do better.
Far be it from me to advocate going away from technology or economics.
Ratherreal progress must be embraced to move away from destructive technologies tobetter technologies.
And economic activity must be done in such a way as tomaximize ingenuity, intelligence and utility to the consumer while minimizingstupidity, destructiveness and blindness that destroys what one has not createdand can't recreate to arrive at utility minimal to null.
Clean energy is progress, and anyone who claims to believe in progress has a logical duty to embrace clean energy.
The anti-clean-energy stance is the stance of the Luddites.
As for the claims that clean energy is "anti-human" - humanbeing is not defined as "the being that burns oil.
" Far more essential to human advancement has been innovation, intelligence and ingenuity; and that meansprogress toward better technologies - progress in the energy sector as much asin all others.
The truly rational, human, progress-oriented stance is therefore an enthusiastic embrace of clean energy and its widespread implementation.
It is this that will move the economy out of the doldrums and into real economic growth.
And it will also minimize blind destructiveness and short-sightedness, preserving what people have not created and aren't capable of re-creating while maximizing utility and economic growth.
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