Credo
"Sign on, young man, and sail with me. The stature of our homeland is no more than the measure of ourselves. Our job is to keep her free. Our will is to keep the torch of freedom burning for all. To this solemn purpose we call on the young, the brave, the strong, and the free. Heed my call, Come to the sea. Come Sail with me." -- John Paul Jones
"Pardon him, Theodotus; he is a barbarian, and thinks that the customs of his tribe and island are the laws of nature" --George Bernard Shaw, "Caesar and Cleopatra"
"And those who were seen dancing were thought to be insane by those who could not hear the music."--Friedrich Nietzsche
"A kind Providence has placed in our breasts a hatred of the unjust and cruel, in order that we may preserve ourselves from cruelty and injustice. They who bear cruelty, are accomplices in it. The pretended gentleness which excludes that charitable rancour, produces an indifference which is half an approbation. They never will love where they ought to love, who do not hate where they ought to hate."--Edmund Burke
“You say that it is your custom to burn widows. Very well. We also have a custom: when men burn a woman alive, we tie a rope around their necks and we hang them. Build your funeral pyre; beside it, my carpenters will build a gallows. You may follow your custom. And then we will follow ours.”--General Sir Charles Napier
"Μολὼν λαβέ" -- Leonidas
"Blogito Ergo Sum" -- Neptunus Lex
I would like to note that as of potentially Summer 2006 and certainly as of March 2008 (see BBC, research by Haas et al @ psu) China has officially surpassed the United States in GHG emissions.
In no way am I condoning this graph or people who use it to back spurious arguments about the environment, just to point out that we’re no longer that baddest kids on the block. After all, of this marked decline in the percent increase of such pollutants within the US, much of it stems from our outsourcing of major steps in the industrial process to places such as China, India, and Mexico that are seeing such substantial climbs in their own.
VR
Worse is when you consider GDP output per ton of CO2. We beat the world hands down for efficiency at wealth generation.
I really have to question the choice of statistics here – showing percent increase without citing the gross output numbers is completely meaningless.
And that’s precisely the beauty of statistics: remove the dimensionality and scale and those numbers can say anything you want.
Cute graphic, but I’d rank it at a third grade level for data presentation, and an undergrad level for obfuscation.
Pls., this isn’t even undergrad level- don’t insult our collective intelligence (at least those of us with legitimate majors).
More than anything this just reeks of ‘political agenda.
When it comes to statistics, counter-argument is always better than snark. Even for those with “legitimate” majors.
Whatever that means.
Well, just off the top of my head, based on those dreaded statistics. The US is responsible for about 25%-30% of worldwide GHG emissions. The rest of the world, mostly Kyoto signatories, are responsible for the tiny 70%-75%. So yeah, the graphic means a lot when you actually know some legitimate numbers and stuff.
Ahh, the “humans are responsible for global warming” farce. Gotta love it.
Jim C
To answer your question: a legitimate major is one where you can’t actually afford to get drunk during finals week because instead of looking forward to psych 101 you’re on your 8th dynamics practice exam.
Secondly, regarding the snark: like any good fisherman, I won’t catch and release a record keeper, I’ll bring the body–
http://www.csmonitor.com/2007/0628/p12s01-wogi.html
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/asia-pacific/6587493.stm
http://www.mnp.nl/en/service/pressreleases/2007/20070619Chinanowno1inCO2emissionsUSAinsecondposition.html
Again, VR, Cheers
Mr.(?) Fetherston, it appears that a legitimate major doesn’t permit one to study interactive representational argument, either. Which is just as well, because you haven’t stumbled into a dorm room bull session, and most of the readers here don’t presume to rest on argument by authority of a degree not yet conferred.
No one disputed your representation that China had become the world’s largest generator of GHG. You were being asked to make some argument supporting your characterization of the matter of the post itself as being sophomoric and politically motivated. Facts don’t have politics, they have interpretations. With your brand of disputation, I could answer, “Oh, yeah?” and we’d be right back where we started from, none of us the wiser.
China is true but irrelevant to the discussion at hand, which is – for those who could not be bothered to click through the links – the fact that those nations that signed on to Kyoto had a higher rate of increase of carbon generation than those who did not. Considering that the whole point of Kyoto was to reduce the rate of increase of GHG, and in fact ultimately decrease the anthropogenic contribution of GHG in absolute terms, your host found that point curious.
Is all. Cheers and regards to you.
Ok fine Lex, but let me ask a question. Seems to me, signing or not signing Kyoto is not the issue anymore. It is that in the macro sense, emissions are increasing-regardless of source. And if that is so, what are the G-7 nations doing to fix that and get all the countries to play by the same set of rules?
To Mr/Ms Fetherston and friends…
Mankind’s “implication” [or not] in whether the globe is warming [or not] requires some vast jumps in logic. To assume that it’s our fault as humans that the globe is warming [although apparently not lately] means that one has to ignore the fact that global warming and cooling have happened before, many times, in the globe’s history. The last major warming period within historical record was between 900 A.D. and about 1300 A.D. [the original computer projections unpon which all this recent climate hysteria is based conveniently ignored this Medieval Warming Period. Tut-tut.]
Anyway … not nearly so many folks around back then, were there? And hardly any of them were running factories, or internal combustion engines either. Even animals numbered fewer in that period, so there wasn’t much in the way of methane being produced by cow farts and other products of animal digestive processes. England, according to one statistic, had no more than one human being per square mile. And America had even fewer people per square mile [we nasty aggressive Americans hadn't even arrived yet.] So neither country can be blamed for producing excessive CO-2, which adherents of Al Gore seem to view as a pollutant.
Actually, CO-2 is not a pollutant, it’s a necessary gas, like oxygen … necessary to the health of the planet and the plants which make it possible for us to live and flourish. You want to live in a sandbox, eliminate CO-2. All plants require it as fertilizer, as you would know if you grew plants.
All this kerfuffle about evil humans causing global warming is simply that — narcississtic kerfuffle.
Julie Andrews sang it in My Fair Lady … “No, my reverberating friend … you are not the beginning and the end.”
Marianne
Skippy-san, the short answer is, nothing. China is the white elephant in the room and no country feels the need to commit economic suicide, either by hard-capping CO2 or by hitting the largest producer, China, with an embargo.
Marianne, bringing up rational arguments, backed by scientific data from reputable sources (JPL, NASA, NOAA… not the IUPC) will never sway those who believe in the almighty Goracle. They approach it in a manner that the hardiest Inquisitor would, never questioning, seeking to eliminate the heretics. They seek a new dark age, a very dangerous meme.
Fetherson, as much as I will agree to the point made about real majors, snarking like that brings much dishonor to the “real” majors. We pride ourselves in logic and rationality, not smarm.
8th Dynamics PRACTICE test? I’m assuming you jest, but I would suggest a major switch if you’re hit with that much trouble over a simple Dynamics class. Vibrations and other Mechanical design classes are based off of it and are more difficult.
Learn to live with the consequences, Skip. Whatever they might be. Twenty-five percent of India’s citizens live on less than 40 cents a day. I don’t know that the 1 billion+ folks who live there are willing to forgo the fruits of modernity in order to prevent what may in any case be inevitable. China, ditto. That’s half the world’s population between the two of them. All of whom get “Lifestyles of the Rich and Famous” on cable.
You know that they’ve found oil beneath 200 feet of ice on Greenland. I wonder how the plant matter got down there, back in the day.
We need to find an economically feasible alternative to the internal combustion engine, is my guess. I expect it will have something to do with nuclear power. Delicious irony.
Skippy-San,
Though it is not a solution it is an answer: Roppongi!
The man is the cause of global warming scam again.
Allen,
It is not an answer but it makes you feel better along the way.
Meet you at Wall Street bar-I’ll buy the first round.
Re: India and China,
There is a big difference. The governments of both countries are more than willing to condemn a certain portion (50% or so) of their population to live in poverty so that they can allow the limited few to live in modernity and can compete by providing cheap labor.
Which hits on two major themes: 1) There is not enough “stuff” to support the current Chinese and Indian expansions and if current trends continue other nations will follow China’s lead. Plus it points up the disparity of who owns the resources.
And second, as more and more of those displaced poverty folks watch lifestyles of the rich and famous-the more disgruntled they become and the harder it becomes to satisfy demand. Which means that wealth-or better yet the distribution of it becomes a real problem for the whole world. So if we are going to advance the cause of peace, the industrial world cannot afford to ignore that issue.
As for Greenland and oil-it all goes back to Pangeia.
I don’t see either the Chinese nor the Indian populations being particularly disgruntled at lack of opportunity these days. The probability to attain an education or to have disposable income is better than it has ever been for either of those countries you cite.
Both countries redistribute wealth most efficiently by focusing on one thing alone – maximizing overall economic growth. Don’t expect any other policy.
Skippy, you seem to assume that it is government’s job to take wealth and dole it out like slices from a pizza to the populace, and thus if I the wealthy Indian industrialist have two slices placed upon my plate you’re left with only the cardboard box to feed your family.
You’re an educated man, you know this is not the case. Neither India or China is a pure market-driven economy, nor is the USA these days, but by and large they make a good attempt.
They laughed at the “trickle-down” theory but I’ve worked for a lot wealthy folks. Can’t remember the last time I was offered a job by a homeless bum.
‘Cept for that government job. Join a company that’s over $4 trillion in debt with unmet pensions. Yeah, that’s the ticket!
– Max
Max,
With due respect, how did to pull that conclusion from my comment? I am simply stating the facts as they are.
I would submit that one needs to take a deeper look at both Indian and Chinese societies these days. In China-wealth is clustered in the cities, and while it is true that the numbers of the Chinese middle class has grown-there are some real bad stories coming out of eastern china and in its rural area. Go root around outside of Guazhong.
Same is true in India. Again it has a rising middle class, but there is also a signficant portion of the population that is being left behind economically and socially. Plus, in the two Indian and one Sri -Lanka city I have been to, the standard of living for the average person sucks.
I never said anything about government redistributing wealth. However I do believe that governments have a responsibilty to create a baseline standard of living for their societies and that is one reason, as much as I hate LKY, I admire what Singapore has accomplished.
To achieve that baseline however it has taken some rather anti-market ideas but they seem to have worked. They have a very tough stand on immigration and a system of 100% health care for their citizens. If they can do it-just about any other major Asian country should be able to do it-but they don’t.
Couldn’t Singapore be a unique case due to its limited size and GDP based on exchange tariff income? I’d wager the example could not be extended to many other countries.
Scratch that exchange tariff, sub-in Entrepot. Coupled with aggressive, dare I say despotic leadership by the party in power, PAP, and a very small population, Singapore can generate large amounts of wealth and direct it with efficiency. Again, I think it’s more of a unique case, but Skippy-san is correct about establishing the base line. The US has established quite a good base line for its people via the method of raising GDP/wealth enough that it spreads. European think-tanks (and traveling college students) are amazed at what the “poor” in the US have, like 60%+ owning more than one car, or 30%+ owning a “big screen” TV (this one’s relative).
Skip, credit card holders in China exceed the US population and are growing at a double digit rate. That implies 40 million+ new members of the middle class every year.
India has further to go, but the trend line is similar.
I don’t think either country is going to take their eye off the ball of expanding the whole pie anytime soon.
(Thank goodness, because if it turns out we are powering through this downturn without a recession it will be because of the nice upturn in exports we are experiencing. Don’t look now. but if you can actually make anything in North America it is your time in the sun.)
Flatlander,
Re: Populations of India and China not being disgruntled. I’d disagree here. A former coworker of mine is actually from India and was discussing with me the recent turnover in government there. Although the urban population is doing relatively well, the vast majority of the people who live in the (largely agrarian) areas outside of the cities are still living in severe poverty.
In effect, not too much has changed for them since the days of Henri Cartier Bresson’s first trips (which I would cite as the best source of photography of India) and Ghandi. (The elder statesman, not the daughter or the rest of the herd since then.)
As far as China goes: erm, after having watched the carefully manipulated spin control put in place by the government there when a Discovery channel crew showed up to do before-after on the Three Gorges project – I’d again beg to disagree. Migration from the interior of the country to the cities again is key to “making it” in life.
Neither country is exactly in a place where it can say that the government is adequately looking after the vast majority of the population.
Drew,
Exactly my point. My observations from friends who do business a lot in India match yours.
Geo-you are very correct about the Singapore government-plus don’t forget a racist orientation that makes the Chinese number one, and Malay’s second and us gweilos come in about 4th I think. Shows what can happen when you trade liberty for security. Plus the Singaporeans put up with a lot IMHO.
But a family can still save for an HDB flat and live better than a lot of people in the world.
Skippy, you stated, “The governments of both countries are more than willing to condemn a certain portion (50% or so) of their population to live in poverty…” which implies government action is the cause of this wealth disparity.
Providing a safety net is one thing, but even in Singapore there is some interesting discussion regarding the proposed GST tax hike and adjustments on business vs personal tax rates, and the PAP admits at best they’ve little influence over what income a citizen may have. China and India, with a larger and more diverse population, not to mention the sharp contrast between their industrial urban areas and their agrarian rural areas, will have even less to work with to address income disparity.
Which, given grain prices recently, that pendulum might just be swinging the other way.
Re: Disgruntlement, yeah sure there are plenty of disgruntled people when you have a billion to choose from, but the point is that on the whole, economic growth is bettering conditions for the people in both countries, and for the most part, the guy on the street knows it and is glad for it.
Which reminds me, for no particular reason, of Virgin Atlantic’s new moniker: “Leave Disgruntled, Arrive Gruntled”