A passion of mine is defending my profession (Science) from assault. Such is approaching a full-time job, as those promoting political or economic agendas are painfully aware that real Science is a major threat to their aspirations — so they are aggressively attacking it on multiple fronts. (See ScienceUnderAssault.info, which was my talk to Congress sponsored by the House Science and Technology Committee.)
We now have yet another distressing example, where a leading scientist has lost his job — apparently for the crime of being a conscientious, competent academic, focused on quality research (instead of chasing grant money).
Dr. Henrik Møller is an world-renown expert on infra-sound, and has published several high-quality studies on low-frequency acoustics (like here, here, here, and here). More recently, some of these have dealt with industrial wind energy noise (e.g. …
Continue Reading“What, in short, if there is government failure in the quest to address what is seen as market failure? James Hansen should consider supporting his [fee and dividend] scheme inside the ivory tower, not outside in the real world. The two are not the same.”
As California labors under its cap-and-trade law for stationary sources, and as Tom Steyer pushes the state to include the transportation market for allowances as well, words of warning come from climate scientist/activist James Hansen. Such updates his biting analysis back in 2012 against California’s initial program.
Hansen’s latest concerns Australia, which ditched their carbon tax. In a July 29th post, Facing Facebook: Australia’s Cap-and-Tax, Hansen states:
… Continue ReadingThe two main points that I made in discussions in Australia re their cap-and-trade were (1) it would be ineffectual in reducing emissions, and (2) it would be recognized as a tax, and thus it would not survive and grow at the rate needed to phase out emissions.
“Economists may not know much. But we know one thing very well: how to produce surpluses and shortages. Do you want a surplus? Have the government legislate a minimum price that is above the price that would otherwise prevail…. Do you want a shortage? Have the government legislate a maximum price that is below the price that would otherwise prevail.”
– Milton and Rose Friedman, Free to Choose (New York: Harcourt Brace Jovanovich, 1979), pp. 219.
“It is a mark of how far we have gone on the road to serfdom that government allocation and rationing of oil is the automatic response to the oil crisis.”
– Milton Friedman, “Why Some Prices Should Rise,” Newsweek, November 19, 1973.
Milton Friedman is best known for Monetarism, a school of economics that effectively challenged fiscal-side Keynesianism.