Standard economics ignores environmental contribution.

Some experts tried to price it and came up with an annual contribution of 142.7 trullion. So if human gdp increase causes an ecosystem service decrease where does that leave us? Kind of killing the goose that lays the Golden Eggs, right?

http://thinkprogress.org/climate/2014/06/09/3446662/natural-capital-142-trillion/

 

It sounds as though, much like certain types of physics where the laws from one realm cannot stretch into another, that current economic theory simply can't account for the costs of human...existence?

For example, if we hypothesize that a single human doing a single economic activity...say....selling a hand knit cap to someone else....then they must accept some cost/damage factor to the environment for having exhaled CO2 during the work, factor in the biosphere damage from farming the cotton, they would be required under economic accounting to sell said knit cap for like $1000 dollars. And that money would allow $1/hour profit for the knitter of the cap, $5 for the person obtaining the cotton, and then the remainder $994 handed over to the "environment" to mitigate the damage of having grown the cotton? Undoubtedly the government would be HAPPY to accept the $994 on behalf of the "environment"...and of course nothing will be done to mitigate the damage in having grown the cotton, or exhaled the CO2.

Governments being quite happy to assign all sorts of costs and damages to things so they can allegedly mitigate it...just look at how well the Hanford nuclear waste cleanup has gone.

Yeah, this doesn't sound right. Economics really can't cover these types of external, nefarious and exogenous items.

 

Try environmental costs of industrial activity. That enumerates easier.

Per say I don't see an environmental cost of CO2 unless fossil fuel is massively the derived source.

It's fun to trivialize the matter with your knit cap example. Still changes in the water, air, soil and climate do exact a cost, even if you can't put a precise dollar and cents amount on it.

 

Why just industrial costs? If we were going to do this, then everything human related, including our very breathing, footprints, chopping down a tree, would need to be enumerated as to a "cost" or some sort. No reason to single out industrial activity, when our very existence has environmental consequences.

Well, certainly any CHANGE, including change in CO2 (regardless of belief in relationships to climate), would need to be quantified. So a person exists, and breathes, thereby creating more CO2 in the atmopshere than would have been there if the person had not existed. This CO2 has just caused a change...if only locally. But locally, it might matter. These things can be quite hard to calculate a cost on I imagine, which must be part of the reason they aren't accounted for within current economic schemes and whatnot.

I trivialized nothing, I assembled a thought experiment to try and understand the premise better. Anything human related extracts an environmental cost...the same could be said of...I don't know...buffalo herds. The places they once roamed, I imagine they trampled all sorts of grasses flat and whatnot, creating local devastation wherever they went. Some of that damage would repair itself, I imagine some never could (bank erosion down into a stream I imagine, as the herd moved down the bank to drink from the stream).

I don't think the buffalo would care much about it, unless the cost (real cost versus some monetary mechanism) prevented them fro getting water, or eating or something. Sounds pretty humanlike in this regard, actually.

 

You are both off point(dramatic modern human generated change is the issue at hand) and trivializing the discussion. The Bible has an expression for this "Strain at a gnat and swallow a camel." And as has been pointed out in theory the flap of a butterflies' wing effects the other side of the universe but to simply make such a point as you basically do is puerile . You've made the conversation dysfunctional. And, oh by the way, we don't per say add to the general level of CO2 simply by breathing. Like other life we are part of a vast recycling process. It is what we do to alter the planet that makes the difference.

 

Blame it on the guy who wrote the title. Certainly I have been discussing the pitfalls, or advantages, or even how to approach the problem of doing such a thing as suggested in the title. Don't blame me for YOU having written it the way you did, and don't expect any of us to be able to read your mind when you write something you really DIDN'T want to discuss. I am trivializing nothing, I am trying to scope out this little mental exercise you have posed. Don't blame me you wrote the lead in so badly that all the sycophants didn't even realize they were supposed to flood in and nod vigorously on demand, rather than folks deciding to actually try and tackle the idea.

Sorry, but you are really wrong. As most folks with a limited perspective are, the system is quite simple. Take a sealed system, containing Earth atmosphere, and drop a person into it. I can promise that CO2 will go up, oxygen will go down. The very existence of that SINGLE person, even in a biosphere as large as this planet, creates a local increase in CO2 because it is what we do. No way around that, and it has nothing to do with recycling.

It is a wonderful fascist control tool as well, can you imagine, taxing and controlling a thing so important and intertwined with human existence that it can be used to control behavior right down to the individual person? Comply…or I'll remove your "permission to emit CO2 license"…it isn't a wonder that the fascists have latched onto it so hard.

 

So it will with a turtle. Since CO2 is food it will stimulate plant growth, photosynthesis don't you know, leading to a recycling equilibrium. The critical problem is the fossil fuel edition plus plant destruction resulting in a steady increase in atmospheric CO2. These matters seem obvious but for some reason you get off on staying in the hypothetical trivial zone.

 

This gets an F.

First, its an article by ThinkProgress, a rabid political organization with the stated goal of promoting the "progressive" agenda.

Second, ThinkProgress is regurgitating a New York TImes article, another virulently political rag. Strike 2.

Third, the NYT article references several articles which have to be purchased to read. Nothing like using references that people aren't going to check. Strike 3.

Total fail.

 

From a climate denialist that's a compliment. As true to the type you offer no alternative - just the standard know-nothing ideological sliming.

Stop making a fool out of yourself here and huddle up with your Rush Limbaugh worshiping buddies. They at least share your inclination to live an ideologically driven fact free world.

 

Those who view humans as the root of all evil don't care. But when a HUMAN does it, well NOW YOU'VE DONE IT!! OH NOES! WHEEZ ALL GONNA DIE!!

What "fossil fuel edition"? You do understand that once an oil or gas field is unearthed, through the same kinds of geologic processes that created it in the first place, that its decomposition leads to putting all that carbon back into the system anyway? Sure, it doesn't happen as fast as when people do it, but it still has the same effect.



So you want to talk about who pays the cost for normal geologic processes that ALSO put all this carbon back into the system? Who is going to foot that bill?

 

I get it. Burning fossil fuel is just nature in action - nothing to worry about. Whether you are a global warming denialist or just here to engage in some odd form of masturbatory display I don't know, but you are certainly not part of any serious discussion.

Bye, bye.

 

I didn't say that. The burning of a fossil fuel moves its carbon into the current ecosystem much faster than through natural bio-degradation. That certainly is something to think about, and this movement at a "faster than nature intended" rate shows up at places like Mauna Loa.

However, humans have CHOSEN to do this. You have, I have, all of us who enjoy our lifestyles built on the backs of our fossil fuel slaves and incredible ingenuity in their utilization. So, I'm completely amenable to the idea that we can also CHOOSE to do something else. Increases in power generated from renewable resources is certainly indicative that we are choosing (some would say forced) to do things a better way.

And this is a good thing.

You started this conversation, and when it turns out that it has quite huge implications, many of which you haven't even considered (as evidenced by you running away even when I am agreeing with you) and folks don't respond as you had hoped, you run from your own topic? If your thinking about your own idea is this pathetic, it is probably best that you tuck tail and run.

 

Platitude as a substitute for serious conversation. My instinct remains right. You're just filling space.

 

Semantic games as a replacement for thought. No wonder you tuck tail and run so easily.

 

It occurs to me since you passively accept species suicide as some kind of curious basis for maintaining your rights, talk about cognitive dissonance, you might want to learn something from this fellow. At least he talks about ending our presence here gracefully.


http://www.counterpunch.org/2014/06/16/learning-to-leave-the-planet-gracefully/

 

It strikes me that you confuse the dispassionate observations of an ex-scientist with disinterest. Passivity? In my case, not at all. I use PVs on the garage roof to fuel the car, I do insulate, I live close to schools and work and mass transit, and planned all of these things quite carefully. Just because the collective has decided to do some pretty silly stuff doesn't mean I dodge personal responsibility for my actions.

Using CO2 as a proxy for FORCING people to do whatever is required of them, that one really hacks me off.

 

Since it never came up in my posts or title I just have to assume environmental public policies hooks directly into your paranoia about the Gestapo taking you down. It sounds like tea party conspiracy thinking to me. As far as public policy you are passive quite obviously which means committed to species destruction. I just thought the guy featured in the link at least might be worth considering as an aesthetic way to contemplate Homo Sapien self-elimination, which you are so obviously committed to.

As far as you claiming I'm not getting you I think maybe you have trouble reading yourself. I think I get you just fine.

 

You can assume as you wish, but in this case it has led you far astray. I'm not worried about the gestapo, I'm worried about basic human activity being regulated in a back door manner, that coincidentally allows the government to do whatever they might wish one afternoon. Like...zoning regulations. HOAs. Nationalization of mineral rights, for the "good" of someone or another. The law of unintended consequences from some ill conceived do-gooder exercise or another.

My commuting car gets 300+ mpg, I can put my commitment in wasting precious resources up against most and come out pretty well. Nearly 40% of the power for the house and fuel for the car comes from windmills and solar....like I said...I do okay in my commitment.

 

How about mandated smog control on cars or the mineral right to move lead into your brain. I've found so called libertarians end up playing pick and choose like everybody else.

I guess I could tell you all about my living off fish while wind motoring my boat at sea and catching trout as my main nourishment while back packing in the Sierras under leg power. What that has to do with broader public environmental standards I haven't a clue. But it would trump you if I wanted to play the I used less than you one-up game.

 

I'm not sure. Just as it seems reasonable to disallow shouting "fire!" in a crowded theater as an exception to free speech, there must be some minimal required interference with absolute freedom to keep people from doing equally stupid things. The question is all about where to draw that line.

As America becomes more Socialist, and demands a largesse from their government not supported by their financial contributions,its citizens appear to be willing to allow the nannification of america to continue unabated as long as the gravy train continues. Unfortunate.

Good for you. And I hitchhiked across the country after my first year in college to spend the summer living off the land in the Cabinet mountains of Montana. Leaving Saturday for a camping trip with the young son, across Utah, then up the California coast to Crater Lake. Not in the EV of course…but still….

Maybe. Maybe not. But does it really matter? I drive an EV and power it from big chunks of wind and sun because I take responsibility for my actions, including CO2 emissions. I do not wish to be forced to take action by misguided do-gooders of dubious honesty and potentially incapable of making even the basic choices I have made, but somehow, they KNOW how I should live.

When sierra club lawyers who flew to Washington and drive SUVs to lobby for yet another "force our clients lifestyle on everyone" meeting, it does nothing but chap my hide. Perhaps this is just where America is headed, it still having some remnants of an america I remember, and me remembering them, I reserve the right to draw my own line, and defend it as I see fit.

 

Just saying I'm against the nanny state is a great way of avoiding a real conversation about the future and denying your own dependence on that nanny state. But it is a common conversational gambit I've found, the ultimate denial. Kind of like faux free marketers avoiding discussing the down stream costs of fossil fuel while screaming to the heavens that the free market is the answer to everything.

I've come to accept that these narcissistic copouts are pretty much what we are left with. Species suicide is conceded and what you are left with is these silly playpen conversations about ME battling this huge socialistic state, and of course ignoring your 24/7 dependence on that state. I guess fantasy is every person's right. If there is no future why not? I just wish people would be more honest about their ultimate passivity in relation to the future instead of casting themselves heroically in such meaningless postures.

On the other hand there is a reason Don Quixote remains such a classic.

 

As a member of this society, like you, we each have some level of dependence on the state as it exists, good..or bad. And YOU might think it is a great way of avoiding a real conversation, but then I'm not the one instantly reverting to political ideology as an excuse to not think about a topic.

I laid out a thought example on how this "assign all real costs" concept works, you are just cheesed that it can't survive the first simplistic example, let alone a complete construct that allows people to live anything like they do today.

no one said you would ever understand how a thought experiment works I suppose, and your instant assignment of political motivation to those who don't comply with your ideology is just the kind of dodge you are whining about.

Stop already. Think about your idea. Defend it. Debate it. You don't get to complain that I ruined it by getting outside it in a heartbeat because you built it so badly.

 

Good start except the dependence is constant 24/7.

I'm trying to talk about environmental costs and you want to tell us about how "chapped" you are by environmental regulations. Who is diverting the discussion into political ideology?

No, you turned the conversation into a meaningless verbal salad. It was an exercise in diversion. Throwing in a breathing human being as relevant to a conversation about environmental costs showed how nonserious you were in addressing what this thread is about.

The best I can make out is you are here to advertise yourself as an environmental good guy, tell us how you don't want government telling you anything and engage in a dilettante's penchant for meaningless erudite display.

 

No you didn't. I began to try and assemble exactly how someone would pay for the environmental costs of doing some simple activity, and you didn't like it because it shows WHY economics can't take such costs into account....no one could afford anything, and the person advocating it is not doing anything other than indirectly saying that all human activity must stop, including those things we like to do that change local CO2 concentrations....like breath.

 

That response is so wonderfully silly I think I'll leave it without comment. You work in the area of science? God help us!