Global Warming's New Math

[Alex Colter]

well for a small group of us 'tis the Pynchons, the Wildes, even the
Valentinuses, that define what it is to be human... trying to generalize
and objectify such a thing can only be destructive...?


On Sun, Jul 22, 2012 at 10:38 PM, <kelber at mindspring.com> wrote:

> You know,  a friend asked me that question once, in a slightly different
> form:  If you were giving the human race a grade, what would it be?  A
> month or so earlier,  I might have said D or F.  But I said "A."  Why?  I
> had just finished reading Gravity's Rainbow for the first time.  And it
> struck me what a wonderful thing human intelligence is, that it could
> create such a mind-expanding novel, filled with wit and morality and
> silliness and fascinating connections.  Why do we consider the Hitlers, the
> Monsantos, the sadists, the criminally greedy the ultimate shapers of the
> human legacy?  Why can't the essence of what it is to be human be defined
> by the Pynchons, the Oscar Wildes, the cruciverbalists, the non-stop party
> people, the beekeepers, the folklorists, the loving grandmas, and on and
> on?  Intelligence, even though it sometimes takes an evil turn, is a rarity
> worth preserving.  Nature, without humans, is cold and dispassionate, and
> just as likely to be ugly.  I vote for us.
>
> Laura
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: Rich **
> Sent: Jul 22, 2012 10:02 PM
> To: David Morris **
> Cc: Monte Davis **, Dave Monroe **, pynchon -l **
> Subject: Re: Global Warming's New Math
>
> ********
> Is humanity even worth saving? I'm ever wavering
>
> Sent from my iPhone
>
> On Jul 22, 2012, at 9:40 PM, David Morris <fqmorris at gmail.com> wrote:
>
> We've (are) lost.  New Orleans and the rest of the world's coastal cities
> are Atlantas's.  And bye bye to countless species.
>
> The 20th/21st Centuries won't be fondly remembered.
>
> On Sunday, July 22, 2012, Monte Davis wrote:
>
>> The core argument, without caveats and qualifications:
>>
>> 1) From Kyoto through Copenhagen, a 2 degree C. global increase has been
>> widely accepted as a threshold we really don't wanna cross;
>> 2) We can calculate how much more fossil-fuel burning will get us there;
>> 3) Current proven reserves held by energy co's and nation/companies are
>> about *six times* that  amount;
>> 4) The stock price of energy companies (and the credit-worthiness of Saudi
>> Arabia, Venezuela, USA states fracking their shale, et al) is tightly
>> correlated with their reserves. Ergo, any combination of policies/actions
>> that would be effective in keeping the increase under 2 degrees would in
>> effect say to all those parties: "Five-sixths of that collective asset
>> just
>> became worthless." (Yeah, I know, coal & oil & gas are also feedstocks for
>> polymers, fertilizers etc, but at this level that's a detail. Yeah,  I
>> know,
>> CO2 capture & sequestration is possible -- but do the math, and it would
>> require infrastructure -- and expenditure -- on the same scale as all
>> today's pipelines and refineries and tankers and coal trains.)
>>
>> Some of you are no doubt saying "duhh," but it snapped my head around even
>> though I've been reading McKibben & co for a long time. It's the
>> difference
>> between a handwaved "the fossil-fuel industry can't keep growing in future
>> decades as it has for the last century or two"... and saying to that
>> industry, the world's largest: "five-sixths of the biggest asset investors
>> recognize in you *right now* is a mirage." That makes it much easier to
>> understand the fervor of denial.
>>
>>
>>
>> -----Original Message-----
>> From: owner-pynchon-l at waste.org [mailto:owner-pynchon-l at waste.org] On
>> Behalf
>> Of Dave Monroe
>> Sent: Saturday, July 21, 2012 9:35 PM
>> To: pynchon -l
>> Subject: Global Warming's New Math
>>
>>
>> http://www.rollingstone.com/politics/news/global-warmings-terrifying-new-mat
>> h-20120719<http://www.rollingstone.com/politics/news/global-warmings-terrifying-new-math-20120719>
>>
>>  **************
>
>
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