Climate change denial and Russian roulette

Here's a comment I just posted in Care2 under the article:

It's Time to Stop Portraying Climate Change as a 'Debate'

The question of climate change comes down to probabilities and balancing risks versus benefits. My understanding of the IPCC predictions is there is a 2/3 chance that things will get very bad by the end of this century. The far end of the bell curve is a one-in-six chance of conditions becoming catastrophic.

The climate change deniers seem to focus on the near end of the curve, the one-in-six chance that things won't be too bad after all. A gun with one empty chamber and five bullets is not very good odds if you're going to play Russian roulette.

Climate scientist James Hansen has called for a global carbon tax with the proceeds to be distributed to everyone (he calls it fee-and-dividend). I have posted a petition calling for a worldwide referendum on such a global carbon tax on Care2. You can view it and,hopefully, put your name to it, at http://www.thepetitionsite.com/286/384/042/petition-for-a-referendum-on-a-global-carbon-tax/

IPCC underestimating extreme climate change

I came across an interesting item recently about Martin Weitzman, a Harvard economist who specializes in the economics of catastrophes, among other things.

According to Weitzman, the IPCC (International Panel on Climate Change) has grossly underestimated the severity of the low probability alternatives in its climate forecasts.

IPCC is predicting that doubling the carbon dioxide in the atmosphere could yield temperature increases of 3.5F (2 C) to 8F (4.5 C) by the end of this century, with a best guess of about 5.5F (3 C). That's with a two-thirds probability – the peak of the bell curve.

That's scarey enough, but when we look at the tails of the bell curve, things get even more disconcerting.

According to Weitzman, there is a five per cent probability of warming greater than 18F (10 C) by the end of this century and a one per cent probability of warming greater than 36F (20 C).
Temperature increases in those ranges would render much of the Earth's surface uninhabitable by human beings.

Climate scientists James Hansen has called for a global carbon tax to control global warming, with the proceeds distributed to everyone as a social dividend or basic income grant.

I have posted a petition on Care2 calling for a worldwide referendum on such a carbon tax. You can view the petition (and hopefully sign it) at http://www.thepetitionsite.com/286/384/042/petition-for-a-referendum-on-a-global-carbon-tax/