Posted by George Huhn on Thu, Nov 26, 2009 @ 08:07 AM
The debate over global warming is heating up again. A group of allegedly stolen e-mails is giving fuel to the fire to those who believe that global warming caused by human activities or Anthropogenic Global Warming (AGW) is a scientific fraud of massive proportions.
However, the question shouldn't be whether or not global warming is caused by AGW. It isn't a yes or no question.
The question should be: What is the percent probability that AGW will have catastrophic effects (between 0 and 100% probability)?
(Those of you who truly believe that the percent probability is 0% can stop reading now. And if you don't believe that any kind of global warming is occurring then you can also stop reading.)
After we have estimated the percent probability, we need to estimate what the economic costs will be if AGW causes a global catastrophe because we did nothing to stop it.
Let's assume the costs would represent millions or billions of dead human beings, beneficial ecosystems destroyed, and mass extinctions of animal and plant species. (I recognize that putting this in sterile economic terms will seem heartless to many, but we don't really have another good way to put a number on it.)
Once we have these two values, we can calculate the "expected value" of the cost of AGW. We'd take the cost of a global catastrophe and multiply it by the probability of it occurring:
Cost($) * Probability of occurrence(%) = expected value of the cost of AGW($)
Once we have that value, it would be prudent of us to figure out what the cost and risks of trying to stop or ameliorate the severity of AGW would be. If the cost to stop it is less than the expected value of the cost of a global catastrophe caused by AGW and the associated risks trying are acceptable, then we're fools as a species not to consider paying the costs of trying to stop it.
What do you think the expected value is?
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