19 July 2014
All you really need to know about climate change
All you really need to know about climate change. We're one big civilisation and climate is changing fast given a sudden imbalance of carbon since the industrial revolution. The mechanism of greenhouse gasses has been known to science for 150 years or so and we're at 400ppm and adding another couple each year, and 2 degrees warming (guessed to come at 450ppm) is a rough, perhaps optimistic, estimate of where runaway climate change could happen given various feedback loops (the ubiquitous "tipping points") and it looks to me like we've got buckley's chance of staying within 2 degrees. With business as usual, IPCC estimates 3-6 degrees rise by 2100. That's just 87 years. Scientists provide the proof of all this for honest readers. To me it looks like game over and sooner than we think. I just hope I'm wrong because nobody wins an argument with physics.
10 January 2014
The doom we never mention
Markus' article is lost to me in the mists of time, but I wrote this letter to the editor of the Canberra Times back in August 2012. Things have changed for the worse since then. These days, if I were brave enough, I'd write the last sentence with "probably" in place of maybe.
Markus Mannheim ("The doom that we never mention", Forum, August 25, p1) sounds as defeated as me on climate change. Why no talk of it?
Clearly exponential growth into a finite world doesn't go. It's cheaper to deal with it earlier; it's not at all controversial in climate science; it's not controversial outside the English-speaking world. But it is here. Climate change is insidious in human timescales.
I ask people: if Queensland floods every five years, can it survive the cost? People understand this. Do pollies or the press? I'm sure they do, but politics and commerce and the short term win out. I expect we will be too late; maybe we already are.
Markus Mannheim ("The doom that we never mention", Forum, August 25, p1) sounds as defeated as me on climate change. Why no talk of it?
Clearly exponential growth into a finite world doesn't go. It's cheaper to deal with it earlier; it's not at all controversial in climate science; it's not controversial outside the English-speaking world. But it is here. Climate change is insidious in human timescales.
I ask people: if Queensland floods every five years, can it survive the cost? People understand this. Do pollies or the press? I'm sure they do, but politics and commerce and the short term win out. I expect we will be too late; maybe we already are.
04 January 2014
Wayback machine: use and abuse of stats
Here's an early one, two letters to the editor of the Canberra Times from early 1999.
My initial comments on Kate Carnell's use of statistics about Canberra
Yesterday, Kate Carnell spoke of Canberra as a “very privileged community” with access to “services at a higher level” (CT, 23 February, p. 1).
This follows regular ABS reports of Canberra as a city with high average wages, a high rate of owner-occupied dwellings with mortgages, a high rate of degree or higher qualifications, and the highest Australian average household incomes.
At least partly, these figures can be explained by a young population with mortgages and families at an financially demanding time of life, years of elite recruitment to the APS and local educational and research institutions, a preponderance of PAYE earners, high labour participation rates, and services (eg, hospitals) provided to a region beyond the local tax base.
We are obviously a comfortable community, but these oft repeated figures suggest a blissful and profound wealth. A visit to the North Shore of Sydney, or ABS figures for the average income in Toorak may surprise those who take these figures in isolation.
My response to a comment on the above letter
Paul Douglas (Canb Times, 5 Mar 99, p. 8) does not seem to have understood the point of my letter on Kate Carnell’s use of statistics to compare Canberra to the rest of Australia.
I argued that Kate Carnell misused these statistics. I still consider my arguments are sound – Canberra’s unusual demographics make comparisons misleading. These demographics are often ignored, not just by Kate Carnell. The statistics imply a greater comparative wealth than is the case, and also hide poverty in Canberra as identified by Paul Douglas. As Crispin Hull also noted recently, Carnell, as our major representative, should not promote common misconceptions of Canberra for political purposes.
On the distribution of wealth in Australia, I have two comments.
Firstly, congratulations to churches and other welfare agencies for their work with the poor. I admire them for this work, and cheer for church leaders arguing the case for social justice. The Left’s retreat into difference politics has left the mainstream churches as a major proponent of a social justice conscience in Australia.
Secondly, I suggest that Paul Douglas’ argument is best directed at those who argue the case for efficiency, globalisation and the market with little regard for distributional effects. We need to imagine alternative economic policies, but I fear there is a lack of readiness to listen.
My initial comments on Kate Carnell's use of statistics about Canberra
Yesterday, Kate Carnell spoke of Canberra as a “very privileged community” with access to “services at a higher level” (CT, 23 February, p. 1).
This follows regular ABS reports of Canberra as a city with high average wages, a high rate of owner-occupied dwellings with mortgages, a high rate of degree or higher qualifications, and the highest Australian average household incomes.
At least partly, these figures can be explained by a young population with mortgages and families at an financially demanding time of life, years of elite recruitment to the APS and local educational and research institutions, a preponderance of PAYE earners, high labour participation rates, and services (eg, hospitals) provided to a region beyond the local tax base.
We are obviously a comfortable community, but these oft repeated figures suggest a blissful and profound wealth. A visit to the North Shore of Sydney, or ABS figures for the average income in Toorak may surprise those who take these figures in isolation.
My response to a comment on the above letter
Paul Douglas (Canb Times, 5 Mar 99, p. 8) does not seem to have understood the point of my letter on Kate Carnell’s use of statistics to compare Canberra to the rest of Australia.
I argued that Kate Carnell misused these statistics. I still consider my arguments are sound – Canberra’s unusual demographics make comparisons misleading. These demographics are often ignored, not just by Kate Carnell. The statistics imply a greater comparative wealth than is the case, and also hide poverty in Canberra as identified by Paul Douglas. As Crispin Hull also noted recently, Carnell, as our major representative, should not promote common misconceptions of Canberra for political purposes.
On the distribution of wealth in Australia, I have two comments.
Firstly, congratulations to churches and other welfare agencies for their work with the poor. I admire them for this work, and cheer for church leaders arguing the case for social justice. The Left’s retreat into difference politics has left the mainstream churches as a major proponent of a social justice conscience in Australia.
Secondly, I suggest that Paul Douglas’ argument is best directed at those who argue the case for efficiency, globalisation and the market with little regard for distributional effects. We need to imagine alternative economic policies, but I fear there is a lack of readiness to listen.
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