Along with the burst of commentary and news about ways to combat climate change there has been a kind of counter movement which claims that the warnings about global warming overstated and exaggerated. One example was the British film “Great Global Warming Swindle” which supposedly debunks the “myth” of human impact on climate change and global warming.
In the midst of all the back and forth, a Canadian economics professor (Peter Tsigaris, an economist at Thompson Rivers University, in Kamloops, BC, Canada) has taken a somewhat unique approach to assessing the costs associated with addressing the human impact on the earth’s temperate and climate–statistical analysis. For a recent exam, he asked his students to consider what would ultimately be more costly:
1. Doing something about climate change based on the idea that humans are causing a large proportion, but later finding out that humans don’t cause global warming; or
2. Doing nothing about climate change based on the idea that humans are NOT causing the phenomenon and finding out that in fact humans ARE causing global warming.
He and his students concluded that the second option would be the most costly because the costs to society would be greatest if society was forced to make drastic, quick changes to alleviate the effects of global warming at some point down the road. Conversely, spending money and resources now and over time is a less costly approach, regardless of who is right about the human impact and climate change.
Aside from the environmental benefits of conservation and the development and use of alternative energy, it can be argued that the research and development associated with a more “green” approach can be technologically and economically beneficial as well. Putting the time and resources into this kind of activity doesn’t have to set the global economy back…it could even move it forward. But spending time and energy to “debunk” the “myth” of climate change doesn’t get us anywhere in the end, regardless of whether humans really do impact global warming.
Wouldn’t it be better to spend a little extra money over time for peace of mind?
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