[EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote:
> James,
>
> I think you've misunderstood (and as a result misrepresented) what I
> said.
>
> I said that people, and the natural systems that we depend on, are
> heavily adapted to our current climate. I did not say, and wouldn't
> say, that we are optimally adapted to the current climate.
>
> You also seem to misunderstand (and misrepresent) what Andrew Dessler
> said on his blog. He said the current climate is optimal, not that
> humans are optimally adapted to current climate.
Well, I'm having a great deal of difficulty in making much sense of the
term "optimal", since it can only (at best) have meaning in the context
of an existing social, economic and technological background. And since
these are always changing, so is the "optimal" level of adaptation.
> These are very different claims. The reason that current climate is
> likely optimal for human society is because we, and the physical and
> natural systems that we depend on, are so heavily adapted (though sub-
> optimally) to that climate.
Your claim that the current climate is "likely optimal" is I believe
flatly contradicted by much of the economic literature, including even
(some of?) the curves in Stern, which imply modest benefits from modest
warming. As I've mentioned here before, the large losses assigned to
greater climate changes are largely based on sensitivity analyses that
impose a significant climate change on an existing infrastructure
without accounting for changes in the social, economic and technological
background, even when these are certain to be large (and may in many
cases be aimed at improving our adaptation to the climate).
One of the most obvious and striking examples is food production. Just
compare how recent historical changes in yield compare to the estimated
effects of climate change - the latter is completely dwarfed by the
former. Projections of X million (billion) in hunger which make no
attempt to account for the realities driving food production are simply
not credible IMO. It is not a linear system and climate impacts are not
simply external and additional to everything else.
> In short, we're not optimally adapted to our current climate, but
> we're better adapted to current conditions than we are to any other
> climate.
Rather than merely re-stating your claim, how about supporting it?
IMO in reality it's a much more subtle problem, concerning the rate of
change, how this compares to economic and technological progress, and
the time scale that infrastructure persists for anyway.
To put it in concrete terms, housing in 2100 will depend on social
structure, technology/materials, and economics every bit as much as
climate, and we don't need to adapt to any of these given that my house
will surely be knocked down by 2040 in any case.
James
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