Environmental Engineering Reference
In-Depth Information
following statement in Johnson's article in the
Herald
of June 2006 which contained
the following statement: 'The Plaintiff (Dr. Ball) is viewed as a paid promoter of the
agenda of the oil and gas industry rather than as a practicing scientist.'
Conversely, genuine scientists tend to rely on their fi ndings and make every
effort to engage in serious debate. An example is the correspondence between Paul
Nurse (President of the Royal Society) and Lord Lawson (former Chancellor of the
Exchequer under Mrs. Thatcher's Government), February 25-March 13, 2013, in
which the latter is openly aggressive: '… there should be a difference between the
behaviour appropriate to a President of the Royal Society and acting as a shop stew-
ard for some kind of scientists' closed shop' (20130311094819649.pdf, received
from a member of Scientists for Global Responsibility).
In a sense, individuals and groups advocating 'business as usual' address a will-
ing audience: the thought that the earth and its denizens are under attack from a
creeping self-infl icted harm, likely to damage our familiar world irreparably, is just
too frightening. Anything that might offer a way out of the dilemma is understand-
ably welcome - no wonder that individuals and organisations which offer reassur-
ance - '[warming] will not pose a devastating problem for our future' (Lomborg
2001
: 4) - easily collect large numbers of devoted followers.
2.3
The Attitude of 'Business-as-Usual' Devotees
2.3.1
Common Objections
Cost is a recurring argument with those embracing a 'business-as-usual' approach.
They argue that the economy is at all times on a path to ever continuing growth,
which should make the next generations richer. This will enable them to deal with
any future problem, including environmental degradation.
In the words of Lord Lawson: '… since there are so many future generations
involved, we ought to make a big sacrifi ce now in order to confer on each distant (and
incidentally better off) generation a trivial benefi t [. .] That is the ethics of the Stern
Review' (
2009
: 86). Lawson then piles insult upon injury claiming in his 'Afterword'
chapter: 'Most reputable economists regard the Stern methodology as deeply fl awed'.
This is misleading but the slur is repeated by Lomborg in
Cool It
(Lomborg
2008
),
mounting an attack by proxy on page 136: 'Yet a raft of academic papers have now
come out all strongly criticizing Stern, characterizing his report as a “political docu-
ment”, using terms such as “sub-standard”, “preposterous”, “incompetent”, “deeply
fl awed”, and “neither balanced nor credible”.' To begin with, the economist Nordhaus
(2006/
2007
) commented that 'the review should be read primarily as a document
that is political in nature and has advocacy as its purpose' (2006). As Stern was
charged with leading a major review of the economics of climate change …, what
else would it be? Lomborg's expression, 'a political document', creates a rather dif-
ferent impression from 'a document that is political in nature'. Nordhaus's criticism
centres upon the low discount rate Stern used instead of the customary fi ve or six, as
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