One of my personal favorite people to hear from is the staunch environmentalists that believe we should live "at one with nature" who fully believe that technologies like renewable energy are the answer to every prayer we have. i had one such conversation tonight at class.

The fact of the matter is that as with all things related to economics and every other science, every action has a reaction. There cannot be two winners and no losers. If a resource is given to one, then someone else must go without. This is known as scarcity.

being one with nature and leaving no footprint is a myth. If that were the case, we would live very short lives starving in a cold cave; and even that would leave a footprint because all that decaying flesh must go somewhere. You see, a fire changes the atmosphere. Killing a deer will impact the herd. Even eating berries off a bush modify the reproduction of that plant and the eating patterns of the local wildlife. We, in fact, must leave a footprint in order to sustain ourselves.

While there is truth to the fact that we are in fact changing the environment (and please, this is not a for/against global warming/cooling/climate change statement), the reasons are often beyond the common understanding of most. You see, with every decision we make, there is a cost. The cost of watching the game may be some time spent working on the car. The additional costs of buying a more expensive name-brand good compared to store brand is what you could purchase with the additional costs.

With the environment, there are also other costs - those that we do not directly pay for. The pollution when we drive our cars and buy gas. Nobody pays for the smog. These externalities are the reason the environment is being affected - we do not pay for the loss of trees or the smog and we therefore place no value on them and do not care for them.

So what is my point? Well, simply that with every decision, there are external costs we do not pay for or often times, even have to deal with. By moving toward one technology, there are the costs of jobs and profits for the makers of the old. Even using new technologies have external costs. Something like a hydrogen powered car, for example.

say a hydrogen car could be made for $20k. Almost anyone could buy one and being that they run on water, and output only water vapor, they seem to be the wet dream of any environmentalist. However, with all the "clean" air comes costs. There are of course the obvious losses in the fossil fuel markets, but what about the reactions caused by the water vapor itself? Look at how unhealthy the air is in LA; all that CO and HC and NOx pollution. imagine if that was replaced with water vapor... the resulting rains would create havoc in southern california. I mean, we have "flooding" and serious mudslides the maybe 5 storms a year we get... california would be come wetter than florida. How's that for climate change?

I guess all I'm saying is fully consider all results of the actions you pursue. If you want to dedicate your life to saving the environment, you must think a little bit with your head. No matter what you do, there will be consequences. They often will be a lot of what you want, but there are those actions that will bring out the unexpected and totally undesired.

Green people are communists if they have any brains, or simply very dumb people.

I read an interesting article the other day. It said that man's impact on the earth mostly in the form of mining and dam building has had more effect than all the tectonic, volcano, earthquake, and erosion activity

the geologists have actually named this period the Anthrocene Period

These people measure "impact" as an inverse of development that makes an environment suitable for humans. The stupid idea, that moves them is that we should not change the world.

Well. The death of that 23 month child in Texas was a victory for the environment, a victory for a virus, that didn't go instinct, as a result of human activity.