What If You're Wrong About Climate Change?

 Let me start by saying straight out that I plan to use AI software ChatGPT to help me write this article. I will put any quotes that I use from it in italics.

First let's define what we mean by "Climate Change"

Climate change refers to long-term shifts in temperatures and weather patterns. These shifts may be natural, such as through variations in the solar cycle. But since the 1800s, human activities have been the main driver of climate change, primarily due to burning fossil fuels like coal, oil and gas.

The only thing we can have an effect on is the last part. "human activities have been the main driver of climate change". Some agree, and others disagree so this article will try to sort out the consequences of each point of view to perhaps help to make a rational rather than emotional decision about your opinion. 

The article will examine both sides of the debate with a different approach than we are used to from public media.

Part 1 - I believe that climate change is being caused by fossil fuels - What if I am wrong?

To look at this I will break down what I think are some main repercussions of the current trend to cut back on fossil fuels. I will use statistics from the USA to illustrate the points.

Economic Repercussions

• Job Loss 
•  According to a Brookings report, nearly 1.7 million people worked in fossil fuel industries in 2019. The Energy Department report stated 2.3 million additional jobs were in energy transmission, storage, and distribution; a number that includes powerline and pipeline workers and more than 900,000 retail jobs, such as gas station workers and fuel dealers.
• Money invested in stocks and bonds of fossil fuel companies will be removed from the market and the companies will declare bankruptcy leaving many investors with losses. 
• According to a report published in March 2021 by a collection of climate organizations titled Banking on Climate Chaos 2021, the 60 largest commercial and investment banks have collectively financed $3.8 trillion in fossil fuel companies between 2016 and 2020.
• Cities and towns dependent on neighboring fossil fuel operations will lose that source of tax revenue as will some of the business in these cities and towns.
• Projects to provide fossil fuel energy for the future will have been delayed or cancelled causing energy shortages. Existing facilities and pipelines may be abandoned and unusable. 

Physical Repercussions

• Many current transportation vehicles would be scrapped and replaced with other clean fueled versions.
• Many petroleum products will be discontinued including plastics, lubricants and others. Substitutions would need to be developed.
• In the industrial sector, the petrochemical industry uses petroleum as a raw material (a feedstock) to make products such as plastics, polyurethane, solvents, and hundreds of other intermediate and end-user goods. Petroleum products are also used to produce chemical fertilizers, synthetic fiber, synthetic rubber, nylon, pesticides and insecticides, perfumes, dyes, paints, carbon black and sulfur.

Political Repercussions

• Tax revenue would suffer and need to be replaced. 
• Fossil fuels provide substantial revenue to the US federal government and many states, tribes, and localities.
• Progressive party politicians who back the idea may suffer voter kickback and funding from those affected by negative economic outcomes. Elections may be lost.
• Conservative politicians who deny the premise may see this as a victory and ride a wave of confidence further to the right. 
• General loss of confidence in political systems that back the premise may occur and cause difficulties in the future.
• Public opinion may move away from concepts of clean air and water thus allowing pollution policies to fall and setting back environmental movements.
• Your country may fall behind or lose power to countries who do not follow the trend away from fossil fuels and use the fuel as a bargaining chip.

Personal Repercussions

• You may lose your job for no reason if you work in the fossil fuel industry.
• You may lose your job in the future because you chose renewable energy as a career and it has failed.
• You may lose money on your investments in renewable energy companies.
• Friends and family may split apart because of differences of opinion and the "I told you so" arguments. 
• You may lose credibility in your pier group.

Part 2 - I deny that climate change is being caused by fossil fuels - What if I am wrong?

Economic Repercussions

• Vast amounts of money will be spent on disaster relief and rebuilding. 
• According to a report published by Reuters in April 2022, the federal government could spend an additional $25 billion to $128 billion annually on expenditures such as coastal disaster relief, flood, crop, and healthcare insurance, wildfire suppression and flooding at federal facilities¹. The United States faced 22 extreme weather and climate-related disaster events with losses exceeding $1 billion each last year alone – a cumulative price tag of nearly $100 billion⁴.
• Economic output will be reduced and growth stifled.
• According to a report from Swiss Re, one of the world’s largest providers of insurance to other insurance companies, the effects of climate change can be expected to shave 11 percent to 14 percent off global economic output by 2050 compared with growth levels without climate change¹. The largest impact of climate change is that it could wipe off up to 18% of GDP off the worldwide economy by 2050 if global temperatures rise by 3.2°C⁴. If that happens, the economy of the United States would be as much as 7 percent smaller than in a world without climate change.

Physical Repercussions

• Crops will fail and warming will alter the environment. Land and animals will be lost.
• According to NRDC, if we don’t limit greenhouse gas emissions from the burning of fossil fuels, the consequences of rising global temperatures include massive crop and fishery collapse, the disappearance of hundreds of thousands of species, and entire communities becoming uninhabitable. Scientists have predicted that long-term effects of climate change will include a decrease in sea ice and an increase in permafrost thawing, an increase in heat waves and heavy precipitation, and decreased water resources in semi-arid regions. Climate change may increase the risk of some infectious diseases, particularly those diseases that appear in warm areas and are spread by mosquitoes and other insects.
• Sea levels will rise due to melting glaciers and ice fields.
• According to National Geographic, sea level rise poses a serious threat to coastal life around the world. Consequences include increased intensity of storm surges, flooding, and damage to coastal areas. In many cases, this is where large population centers are located, in addition to fragile wildlife habitats. Potential effects of sea-level rise include surface inundation of low-lying coastal areas and changes in the altitude of the water table and corresponding distance from the land surface to the water table (depth to water), the position of the freshwater/saltwater interface in the aquifer, and the volume of base flow in freshwater streams.

Political Repercussions

• Millions of people will need to leave their homes and migrate to areas where they can survive rising temperatures.
• According to Time, if climate change is left unchecked, bigger storms, unsurvivable heat and disappearing coastlines will leave billions displaced or struggling to survive. This would in turn create unprecedented strain on political and social institutions, not mention the global economy. No one really knows exactly how the fallout will occur. As climate change takes its toll on Earth’s physical planet, it will also cause social, economic, and political chaos as refugees flee areas that can no longer sustain them.
• Conservative party politicians who deny climate change may suffer voter kickback and funding from those affected by it (everybody). Elections may be lost.
• Progressive politicians who believe the premise may see this as a victory and ride a wave of confidence further to the left. 

Personal Repercussions

• You may lose your job if you work in the fossil fuel industry.
• You may lose money on your investments in fossil fuel companies.
• Friends and family may split apart because of differences of opinion and the "I told you so" arguments. 
• You may lose credibility in your pier group.
• Your home location may become unlivable due to extreme weather or pollution.
• Your home may be destroyed.
• You and your family may be dispossessed and forced to move.
• You and or loved ones may die.

Part 3 - I'm not sure so what should I do to increase the odds of a better life for me and my family?

One thing I did discover using ChatGPT for research is that it's sources (scouring the internet) overwhelmingly favor reduction in the use of fossil fuels. In every case when I asked it to give me repercussions of ignoring climate change (Part 1 above), it came back with what I asked but then cited reasons not to ignore changing climate. While this is not definitive, it tells me that the majority of public opinion and scientific evidence is pointing to climate change causing big problems in the future.

• I think it's a sure thing that if we do nothing about fossil fuel use, the environment will get worse than it already is. Pollution is a bad outcome no matter what you believe in. Its proven and you can see the smoke in the air with your own eyes.
• If you go along with the majority of public opinion it is easier to move ahead in your life. A wise bit of advice from the investment community says "Follow the money". Going against the grain is not the easy solution to life in our societies.
• If you believe anything from the topics I have brought up here, you can see that not investing in a clean future could cause catastrophic repercussions if not for you, at least for your kids and grandchildren.

A final word from GPT in the form of a poem about climate change. A bit corny but what the heck!

The world is changing, can't you see?

The air is thick with CO2

The ice caps melt, the oceans rise

The planet's future's in disguise

The forests burn, the droughts persist

The storms grow stronger, can't resist

The climate's changing, that's for sure

We must act now, there is no cure

We must reduce our carbon footprint

And find new ways to live and sprint

We must protect our planet's health

And leave behind a better wealth

For future generations to come

Let's make sure they have a home

Where they can breathe and live and thrive

And keep our planet's hope alive

So let's unite and take a stand

And save our planet, hand in hand

For we are all in this together

And we can make it last forever!

Artificial Intelligence Application ChatGPT - Threat or Tool?

 ChatGPT is in the news every day now and it's interesting to follow the multiple sides of the discussion about its merits and pitfalls as well as the fears of AI taking over and destroying us.

I'll ask ChatGPT to describe itself so we can start with that. 

How do you describe yourself in simple terms?
I am a computer program designed to understand and generate human language.

How do you work?

I work by processing and analyzing large amounts of text data using machine learning techniques. This allows me to understand the patterns and relationships in the language, and generate responses based on that understanding. I am also continuously learning from new data and user interactions, which helps me to improve my responses over time.

And here's a link so you can check it out yourself.

Here's my take:

Way back (50 years) when I was in 2nd year mechanical engineering, I managed to save up enough pennies to buy myself a calculator. I think it was $40 and all it did was basic math with maybe one memory function. At the time, we were allowed slide rules in exams but not calculators. The fear on the street at the time was that wide use of a calculator would ruin children's ability to do simple math in their heads and that people without calculators would be at a disadvantage in an exam. 

Guess what, it did just that. Have you ever been in line to buy something when the power goes out? Nobody can give the correct change without the cash register (calculator). The store is shut down. But also, have you ever been in a math exam without a calculator?

But ... it seems that we as a society have managed to get by without being able to add or subtract on demand. Tools to do that are all around us.

How about spelling. Same thing has happened. It used to be frowned upon to write a letter with bad spelling. No more. Firstly, we really don't care anymore as long as it's understandable and secondly, spell check is rampant in our world of communication and its use is not difficult.

Do computers make us dumb? There is an argument about that too.

Each of these examples has two truths depending on how you look at them. 

- If you are threatened by them, then they can be thought to be harmful to your way of thinking or at least going against your view of the future.

- If you think of them as evolutionary tools helping advance our aptitude and way of life, then they are all just steps along the path to the future. 

The question that arises then is, do we seek to regulate the application to make it more acceptable to the former group, or is that even possible. Looking at my other examples above (calculator, spell checker) it is probably safe to say there is no way these could be regulated without severely difficult philosophical arguments and oversight. In fact, I think we could agree that without them running free we would not have their full benefits in our society.

Are calculators and spell checkers used for evil? Of course, they are used by evil people to further their evil goals. Could we stop that? Doubtful. Once the pandora's box is open, it is impossible to close without authoritarian rules and oversight. And then the question becomes whether or not it is the authoritarian that is evil or the application?

I know, you are now thinking my arguments and examples are much too simplistic to be meaningful. My engineering background shouts at me to simplify simplify simplify so that the problem can be understood and solved. So, bear with me!

I argue that AI applications like ChatGPT are best left unfettered so that the market (i.e. the need) decides how they will evolve. Evil players will use them, but the overall drive for improvement will drive them to mainly good uses and features. Already there is a real market posed by teachers to develop applications that can identify ChatGPT output thus avoiding plagiarism by their students. 

So, my conclusion to myself is that we need to encourage AI applications / tools for the betterment of our society and use them where necessary to aid in the development of more and better tools as we grow.

If you disagree or have other ideas to discuss, please comment. If you agree, see you on the other side.

In closing, I asked ChatGPT to "Write one paragraph justifying your existence."
As a language model, my existence serves the purpose of assisting users in generating human-like text. I am trained on a vast amount of text data, allowing me to understand and respond to a wide range of questions and prompts. By using me, individuals and organizations can save time and resources that would otherwise be spent on writing or editing tasks. Additionally, my ability to understand and respond in natural language can be beneficial in areas such as customer service, content creation, and language translation. My existence ultimately aims to improve efficiency and productivity for users.