8.03.2015

Carbon isn't pollution





It's a natural element, and one of the basic building blocks of life on Earth.

And no, you can't "stop" carbon emissions without exterminating every animal on Earth.

Redefining clean, natural air as "pollution" is exactly what Orwell warned us about:
“Don't you see that the whole aim of Newspeak is to narrow the range of thought? In the end we shall make thought-crime literally impossible, because there will be no words in which to express it. Every concept that can ever be needed will be expressed by eactly one word, with its meaning rigidly defined and all its subsidiary meanings rubbed out and forgotten. . . . The process will still be continuing long after you and I are dead. Every year fewer and fewer words, and the range of consciousness always a little smaller. Even now, of course, there's no reason or excuse for commiting thought-crime. It's merely a question of self-discipline, reality-control. But in the end there won't be any need even for that. . . . Has it ever occcured to you, Winston, that by the year 2050, at the very latest, not a single human being will be alive who could understand such a conversation as we are having now?”

― George Orwell, 1984

3 comments:

K T Cat said...

Now that carbon is a pollutant, we are all just waste material. We should thank Planned Parenthood for dealing with the problem at the source.

tim eisele said...

"It's a natural element, and one of the basic building blocks of life on Earth."

So are nitrogen and phosphorus, but if you get too much nitrate or phosphate into a river or lake, you get a eutrophic mess and all the fish die. And yet, in other circumstances, exactly the same chemicals are called fertilizers. Calling something a "pollutant" is like calling a plant a "weed" - it is all about being somewhere that you don't want it, and has nothing to do with whether it is a good thing to have in some other location.

If you want to argue that we need not worry about increasing CO2 in the air because you think it will be cheaper to manage the effects as they come up than to try to cut emissions, fine. I think that argument has a lot of merit, myself. But please don't pull out the old "it's harmless because it's natural" schtick. You know what kind of people make that argument. You don't want to be like them.

WC Varones said...

ObamaFAIL! New EPA rules will make no significant change in Global Warming.

Happy Super Tuesday!