This page is a condensed rebuttal of the unsustainable flights of fancy of the cornucopian
scientific propaganda, that believe business as usual with no-holds-bar technology will eventually save the Earth for those that matter. Probably the most dangerous thing on the infobahn propagating this delusion are John McCarthy's web-pages about "Progress And Its Sustainability". John lectures on the 'sustainability of progress' while researching the technological opportunities for humanity at Stanford University. John definitely is one smart dude and I have a lot of respect for his work in
artificial intelligence. Generally John's pages are refreshing, frank appraisal of technologies
potentials, however as a self proclaimed "extreme optimist" many (yours truly included) would regard his optimism as unfounded to the point of delusion. John's prescription are all but devoid
of any considerations a social justice, environmental sustainability or ethical dimensions. Fallacy 1#
Desirability of Nuclear Power for unlimited energy. John in his page
'Sustainability of Human Progress' has a thumbnail of his argument "that human material progress is desirable and sustainable. With the development of nuclear energy, it became possible to show that there are no apparent
obstacles even to billion year sustainability."
Or put another way with nuclear energy as an unlimited energy source all environmental problems can be over-come in time with technological replacements where the eco-system can no-longer provide!
Given my own views on Nuclear Power, I'm obviously not religiously anti-nuclear (John's dismissal of anti-nuclear
arguments). However I'm very suspicious of mixing commercial imperative to maximize shareholder's profit, with quality and integrity needed for a safe nuclear operations. With the exceptions of some of Canada's, Europe's and Argentine's, recent developments in reactor design, there has not been much cheery developments in the industry of late. Not that some-day the nuclear waste-cycle will be solvable in an environmentally benign way, so that it doesn't require police-state restriction on individual freedom to store securely for thousands of years dangerous nuclear by-products, nor massive state underwriting of the rare but devastating risks and accidents. In the meantime the rest of the industry particularly USA's and Russian equivalents should be sternly restrained from building any-more of these ill considered Faustian toys. John does have some good explanatory pages on nuclear issues.
BTW: 2004 John is now arguing that industrial strength Solar
as an alternative unlimited energy. Much as I like Solar power unlike his Nuclear stance (with Bernard Cohen's calculations) John provides no numbers to back up the assertion that enough power from Solar can be delivered to the Earth surface to meet his un-calculated future world energy needs.
Fallacy 2#
Population growth & exploitative living standards are not a cause for concern! While
the following statements follow logically from John McCarthy's opening assumptions about unlimited energy. They can not be squared with any equitable economics entailing full-cost recovery for the
whole nuclear waste cycle. John is very strong on logic, but as many an expert will assure one, logic is only a method of getting things wrong with confidence. John also in his page on 'Sustainability of Human Progress' says;- "In particular, we argue that the
whole world can reach and maintain American standards of living with a population of even 15 billion. We also argue that maintaining material progress is the highest priority and the best way to ensure
that population eventually stabilizes at a sustainable level with a standard of living above the present American level and continues to improve thereafter. I offer no opinion about a
"right" population, and I suspect that population will eventually be limited by a sense of crowdedness rather than by material considerations. .......There is a widespread belief that the
present standard of living of the advanced countries is not sustainable and not extendable to the present backward countries. We don't agree. This exposition mainly concerns scientific and
technological bases for optimism rather than the historical and economic arguments ably advanced by the late Julian Simon
." Fallacy 3#
What is Progress? & Revealed Preference.
John makes a lot in his pages, about being open to other people's comments, but as friends have experienced he goes very quiet when his argument fails. John's definition of 'Progress' is little like a
self-fulfilling prophecy, settle on your answer before defining your term. John in his page on 'What is
progress?' says;- "People often get into arguments about what constitutes progress. Some say that what others regard as progress is not progress at all. We
bypass these arguments by considering a country or a section of a country to have progressed if people who have a choice move to it and adopt its ways - revealed preference, the economists call it. We
give short shrift to arguments that people didn't know what they were doing when they made their choices. According to revealed preference, America is the most progressive country. So far as I know
there is no other country that has more immigrants from America than America has immigrants from that country."
As I concur and one of my mates pointed out in an 'unanswered' email to John;- "Personal I would view the 'Lowlands & Scandinavian' countries in Europe, and Japan to be more advanced societies
than the USA. Though your 'revealed preference' test would fail on all of them, the European cases because of the cold weather, and the Japan's case because of the cultural isolation qualities of the
society. 'revealed preference' is a vote on total perceived desirability. Any country that made alcohol and drugs free to its public would also in all probability generate a very strong 'revealed
preference'!" Balderdash 1#
Avoiding Global Warming. Given the
relative well researched high quality of most of John McCarthy's work I was recently flabbergasted to read the following from his (19-Oct-2003) page titled 'Avoiding Global Warming'.
"It may not be necessary to make large efforts to avoid global warming. First of all, it may not happen, and, secondly, it may not be harmful if it does."
John is writing here in the future tense "may not happen". Not even honournable Greenhouse sceptic's are that delusional, "may not happen"
is the stuff of flat-earth thinking. So the documented 30% increase of CO2
in the atmosphere since the industrial revolution has no correlation with the observed rising global temperature? {BTW: Where did I leave my flying pigs?}. Far more august scientist like the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change believe
that Global Warming is a very real man made threat that needs urgently addressing. Yes 'Global Warming' maybe beneficial for the continental USA, but it is making a real mess of other parts of the world!! To get a more balanced coverage of Climate Changes start with the
FAQ (Frequently Asked Questions) on the New Scientist website.
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The Myth of :
John McCarthy's Sustainable Progress
