Bill,
I think the CC/cancer analogy is particularly valuable (and it's one I've
used many times). I'm most struck by the timing of our changing
awareness. I'm just barely old enough to remember a time when a lot of
adults smoked, the statements from the US Surgeon General were a new thing,
For both governments and NGOs there is still a taboo on official discussion
of post-GHG emissions climate intervention. There are many reasons for
this- and not silly ones either!- but the net effect is unfortunate. It's
as if the American Cancer Society dared not mentioned curing or treating
I didn't mean to imply that policymakers have a hidden agenda to move
towards GE by this route, only that it would be a necessary, clarifying
step.
I also think that these adaptation measure are at heart uncontroversial,
though very dramatic, and so are well-suited to consensus policy-making.
