The Joy Of Global Warming
Bjorn Lomborg likes to provoke and this article in the Sunday Times certainly does. He starts the article like this.
As I fly into a snow-bound Britain, I realise that you might be asking where global warming has gone as you shiver in the coldest March for 50 years and wonder what you will do if gas has to be rationed. I have been involved in the climate debate for more than a decade, but I am still amazed at how wrong we get it. Let us try to restart our thinking on global warming.
Yes, global warming is real and mostly man-made, but our policies have failed predictably and spectacularly.
He then goes on to say that Kyoto has failed.
But he does produce a solution that could be a win-win situation for everyone.
He says that we should spend money on research!
He is right!
Just look what has happened to products like computers because money has been spent on research!
I have heard some wacky ideas to generate energy and cut carbon dioxide emissions over the last few years. Some of them might just be the things we do to save the planet.
But then engineers and scientists have a track record in digging us out of the holes that politicians and others have got us into.
Where for instance would Britain be today without the genius of Henry Royce, Lord Hives, RJ Mitchell, Alan Blumlein, Alan Turing and Sydney Camm. Under a Nazi jackboot perhaps?
But they and others answered Churchill’s plea and gave the country the tools to finish the job.
A similar massive effort today on a world-wide basis would I believe solve the problems of global warming and create a world fit for our descendents.
The same approach could be used on all of the major problems of the world like cancer, providing clean water, housing and food production.
Cooked Meats and Cancer
The World Cancer Research Fund are now saying that cooked meats, such as ham and salami and bacon, can cause cancer and should be banned from lunch boxes.
They have form in this area and have been warning for some time. Do I eat much cooked meats? Not really, as I possibly eat them once or twice a month. I did eat a bit more at the weekend, but it was my party.
They also provoked this blast from the Daily Mail. I’ve read that and that perhaps says one important thing and that is moderation in all things.
But what is missing from all of this research and rants is any degree of statistical sense.
We could take a silly example, which states that if you spend all your time on a computer, playing computer games as a child that this is bad for your health. Other research could also say that playing on railway tracks is also bad. They both probably are, but the second is many times more dangerous than the first and people these days tend to lump everything as equally bad.
Now my worry about this “ham sandwich is bad for you” scare is that I’ve never seen any relative risk information compared to say cigarettes, obesity, excessive drinking or spending eight hours a day on a sunbed. So you get the obese smoker giving up cooked meats as his bit towards better health.
So what are the relative risks?
The best book on the subject is The Skeptical Environmentalist by Bjorn Lomborg. He analyses the risks and prints them in detail. Everyone should read his book. You may not agree with everything he says, but it will certainly make you think.
But bear in mind one thing; if you want to live a long time, you can increase your chances by not smoking, eating a good diet, exercising and maintaining a healthy weight. I do all four. But then so did my late wife and she died at fifty-nine!
One point about diet is that diagnosed coeliacs on a gluten-free diet have a twenty-five percent less chance of cancer. That more than mitigates the bad affects of a ham sandwich in gluten-free bread.
The Anonymous Widower 