Is the hype about global warming overblown? Could global warming actually be a good thing, with positive results? Bjorn Lomborg has the audacity to ask this question in his recent book, Cool It.

He starts by considering the various exaggerations that are made by people trying to persuade us to take action against warming. For instance, he carefully analyzes issues such as anticipated temperature increases (which are occuring mainly in cold climate winters, which is not something most of us would mind that much) and sea level increases (no more than in the last century).

Then he considers the resources we would have to put into "solving" global warming. He believes they are overwhelming compared to the minimal benefits that would be achieved. In many cases, in fact, there are benefits to allowing warming to continue. For example, there are far more deaths due to the cold (about 600,000 worldwide each year) than heat (about 170,000 each year). So the net effect of warming would be to save lives.

He does not go so far as to say that we should encourage warming, although unfortunately he doesn't clearly state why. However, my personal opinion after living far too long in a cold climate that warming would be an excellent idea and should be encouraged may have tainted my reading of his words.

Finally, he notes that the resources spent on fighting warming might be better spent on other things, such as ensuring good water supply to third world countries. These would save enormously more lives than trying to stop warming and at a much lower cost.

Scientists asked to prioritize investments in this way would give little to nothing to fight global warming, indicating that when preventing warming is presented fairly and its impacts are weighted, it is one of our most expensive and least effective policy possibilities.

I think his book is well worth reading. It's a fascinating take on the other side of a controversial issue, one that few have the guts to even consider. His courage is worth noting and supporting.

D

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If I run across the book in the library I will check it out.

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If you happen to see it in the Barnes & Noble, it's so short it could be read in a few hours. If my memory serves it was in the environment section with a bunch of nature books.

D

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