If there are people to worry about in 20800, then it is very likely that they will be better equipped to deal with any concievable "damage" than we are today. So yes, I think a harm applied in 20800 should be weighted less than one applied in 2080.
A related, but indepedent, concern is the cost to us now of avoiding a harm in 20800 versus the cost to a future generation of doing so. Once we start talking about these fantastically long timescales there is essentially no way to predict future cost. Let's suppose it would cost us 1% of GDP now to prevent a disaster in 20800. But perhaps by 2625, even if we do nothing now, the people with their flying cars, fusion reactors, and interstellar gateways can prevent the same potential disaster for 1/10000 the cost. If there were no intermediate harm by waiting 600 years, then obviously the right thing to do would be to wait. Even if science can predict the long-term consequences of the physical changes we make to the environment, it is implausible that we can predict the future of human society to such a degree that we could make any kind of cost-benefit analysis that would be sensible for the distant future. Neither the relative significance of the harm nor the cost of counter-acting it are things that are foreseeable on the timescale you are talking about. So yes, I do think discounting the very distant future makes sense. There are plenty of reasons to be concerned with the next hundred years without needing to get lost in open-ended speculation the next hundred thousand. -Robert A. Rohde http://www.globalwarmignart.com/ On Aug 3, 3:06 pm, "Michael Tobis" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > I agree that we need a metric. I think the idea that it is even > commensurable with dollars is dubious, but that's another topic. Let > me stipulate that we ahve some measure of value, and discuss whether > any discount rate at all is morally defensible. > > While we must make some discounting of uncertainty, I do not think a > given probability of making the seventieth generation live in a world > subjected to some specific amount of damage should be weighed any > differently in our calculus than the same probability applied to the > current generation. > > In the case of the clathrate release, we are discussing a high > likelihood of affecting hundreds of generations. I admit that the > likelihood is a real issue, but let's presume some mutually agreed > upon risk weighting, and presuming all else equal, why should we care > whether the hundreds of generations affected start in 2080 or 20800? > > You may argue that no discount is mathematically pathological. I think > that's a separate question. (It seems moot, because risk weighting > will avoid the pathology, but that's not the point.) > > My question is what the moral basis is for valuing *equally likely* > disaster in 20800 so much less than a comparable disaster in 2080. > > mt > > On 7/30/07, Don Libby <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > > > > > > > ----- Original Message ----- > > From: "Michael Tobis" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> > > Newsgroups: gmane.science.general.global-change > > To: <[email protected]> > > Sent: Sunday, July 29, 2007 1:12 PM > > Subject: [Global Change: 1981] The seventieth generation > > > > Economic arguments would > > > discount the hunderds of generations in the future replay of the > > > Paleocene/Eocene cataclysm to maybe fortyseven dollars and eighteen > > > cents. Do we have a moral right to weight the distant future against a > > > more or less arbitrary contemporary measure of value? > > > > mt > > > You seem to be suggesting there is some measure of value, or "moral right" > > that is not more or less arbitrary. In reality we have a difference of > > opinion about the discount rate: should we discount it to $47.18 or to forty > > seven kazillion dollars and 18 cents? This leaves us with a political > > struggle between those who prefer a high discount rate and those who prefer > > a low one. Should we tax coal at $200 per ton or $200 kazillion per ton as > > Hansen suggests (i.e. "ban coal")? > > > -dl- Hide quoted text - > > - Show quoted text - --~--~---------~--~----~------------~-------~--~----~ You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups Global Change ("globalchange") newsgroup. Global Change is a public, moderated venue for discussion of science, technology, economics and policy dimensions of global environmental change. Posts will be admitted to the list if and only if any moderator finds the submission to be constructive and/or interesting, on topic, and not gratuitously rude. To post to this group, send email to [email protected] To unsubscribe from this group, send email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/globalchange -~----------~----~----~----~------~----~------~--~---
