The curious task of economics is to demonstrate to men how little they really know about what they imagine they can design. – F.A. Hayek
Posted in Behavior, Environment, Methodology, You Can't Have it Both Ways on May 14th, 2012
Caveat Emptor: I believe the Precautionary Principle is bunk. What is the Precautionary Principle? It’s a doctrine that turns the tables on where the burden of proof in a policy ought to fall (it’s not just an argument, it’s a policy response). I’d suggest that in “typical” discourse and policy, the burden of proof falls [...]
Posted in Environment on Apr 30th, 2012
How about some things to smile about this week? I’ll leave it to you to decide what the real message is behind any of these. First up, Gallium! We ain’t runnin’ out of it anytime soon. According to this report from the US Minerals Management Service (by the way, since reconstituted – extra credit if [...]
Posted in Economic Illiteracy, Education, Environment, You Can't Have it Both Ways on Apr 19th, 2012
Our student paper printed this article on how arguments against wind are overblown. For interested students, I will be going into the gory details in Eco 238, so will not rehash all of the economics of wind here. I’ll sporadically return to this piece in between my puppy drownings and coal burning rituals, but here [...]
Posted in Environment, You Can't Have it Both Ways on Apr 18th, 2012
This is circulating on campus. I’ll be giving a private Earth Day talk myself on Sunday. In preparation for it I am going to drown a few small puppies using a swimming pool paid for with Exxon money. If you’d like to see what the U of R has planned for Earth Day, check it [...]
Posted in Environment on Apr 18th, 2012
When folks who study the damages expected from climate change report on things like, “cold related deaths” as compared to “heat related deaths” what are they actually comparing? I’ve read dozens of scientific papers indicating that exposure to cold is far more serious a health risk than exposure to heat. On the other hand if [...]
Posted in Environment, Ultimate Resource on Apr 16th, 2012
Unless you want to find a justification for ending global capitalism of course. A few weeks ago I reported on how malaria deaths, the single greatest threat that we think will meet us from a warmer planet, are already on a rapid retreat – with a decrease by one-third in Africa over the last decade. [...]
Posted in Environment, Fun Facts on Apr 14th, 2012
Do not get me wrong, mercury is some really awful stuff and we don’t really want to be ingesting it. But consider the data embedded in the following few sources: the amount of mercury concentration and disposition across the US bears almost no resemblance to where coal fired power plants are burning. In fact, people [...]
Posted in Environment on Apr 10th, 2012
We’re doomed! And in other news: we’re doomed:
Posted in Environment, Methodology on Apr 2nd, 2012
I see that many folks decided to turn down their light-bulbs and instead use candles. To which I can only ask: does anyone know if candles are worse for the environment than light bulbs powered even by coal-fired nuclear plants. Hint: look at the prices. Has anyone bothered to research this, or was this the [...]
Posted in Economic Illiteracy, Education, Environment, Methodology on Mar 30th, 2012
It is extremely common in the modern “E”nvironmental movement to see the conflation of normative opinions of what various environmental policies ought to do with actual claims regarding the actual conduct and character of real world environmental policy. Even though many of us believe that good species conservation policy (for example) ought to encourage the [...]
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