Quote Originally Posted by Feanor
The naysayers could turn out to totally right about global warming, or global warming and its consequences could turn out to be worse than even the most dire predictions.

But take a lesson from game theory:
  • What if we try to slow down non-existent global warming? We p!ss away a few hundreds of billions of $$ and end up with nothing to show except less polution, decades more of oil & natural gas, and maybe, e.g., get better public transit.
  • What if we ignore actual global warming? We temporarily save a few hundred billion dollars, but then have to, (among other things), relocated the extimated 600 million people who now live in costal regions that will be flooded.
It would be foolhardy to take no action 'till global warming is proven. Of course, whenever there is big change, somebody's ox gets gored, (no pun intended). And ox owners will tend to resist change that's why their called "conservatives".
I just wrote a rather long-winded post that said the exact same thing, in way more words.

Well done.

From a risk management perspective, working now to prevent global warming is the only logical conclusion. Even if it turns out to be a myth. It's because we don't know, and because there's reasonable evidence and cause to worry, that we should commit some resources now, not 100% of efforts, but something meaningul to try and keep on top of things.

The consequence of error is catastrophe.

I'd rather give posterity the benefit of hindsight to ignore the global warming myth, than to burden them with floods and fires, and droughts and dirty air, and all the bad stuff global warming is predicting.

For me the question is do I take responsibility and accept a tolerable, affordable, small share of the cost now, or do I ignore it for whatever reason and place all the risk on future generations to benefit me today?

But I'm only 1 vote.