Phrase of the week

September 28, 2014 at 11:23 AMMichele Mottini

these days, if I need any coding done, I use the extremely high-level programming language called “undergrad”

Scott Aaronson in Do theoretical computer scientists despise practitioners?

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Fighting global warming: cheap and easy!

September 20, 2014 at 4:54 PMMichele Mottini

…according to Paul Krugman, and many others before him.

If you go and read the IMF working paper that Mr. Krugman links you discover that the optimal carbon prices they talk about would

. . . reduces CO2 emissions from the top twenty emitters by 13.5 percent (a 10.8 percent reduction in global emissions).

 

So actually 11% is cheap and easy – but doesn’t ‘fighting global warming’ require something like 40% to 70% cuts (or maybe 10% A YEAR)?

If it is so cheap and easy why no country actually runs on solar and wind? Israel for example: advanced, relatively small, with surely a big interest in not depending on fossil fuels? Or Taiwan? Or Switzerland? All in the clutches of the oil lobby and the Koch brothers?

The best we have are the likes of Germany – not exactly a shining example. Maybe it is due to the famous German disorganization, fecklessness and incompetence and everyone else can do much better?

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