Defence and the Free Market

[pErvinalia]

Yeah, himself, and morals that were relevant about 600 years ago..

[Seth]

Actually, some parts of the private sector, for instance those involved in manufacturing solar cells or wind turbines, or those involved in insurance are totally on board...

Only because the government subsidizes their industries with massive amounts of taxpayer money, without which they would cease to exist almost immediately, which completely eliminates them as free market participants.

Initial subsidies were needed to prime the pump, but have substantially decreased in most sectors, and renewable energy is now at a par in terms of cost with big coal...

No it's not, and anybody who says different is boguing the data to make it appear that way. And since you can't store "renewable energy" like wind and sunshine it will never be able to meet the demand. And coal, by the way, is a "renewable energy source" and is comprised of nothing more than stored sunlight, it just takes a little longer to store.

[Seth]

And of course, subsidies to and ignoring pollution from fossil fuels is irrelevant to Seth.

Nobody's ignoring pollution from fossil fuels. Trillions of dollars have been spent cleaning up coal emissions in the past 3 decades or more to great effect...so much so that the bitch from the greens isn't about any real, harmful pollutant like sulfur dioxide or acid rain it's a vacuous argument about a substance that is essential to plant life on earth; CO2. More CO2, more plant life...a fact that's already been proven to be taking place. More plant life, more photosynthesis, more photosynthesis more carbon sequestration for future coal production and more oxygen produced. It's a closed system that self adjusts and has been doing so for billions of years now.

And subsidizing oil, gas and coal (to the tiny extent they currently are) is fine because it reduces the costs of electricity, fuel and heating for everyone, whereas subsidizing "renewables" only RAISES energy costs for everyone because it's SO FUCKING INEFFICIENT.

Besides, who really wants to look at mile after mile after mile after mile of windmills blighting the horizon during the day and an entire hemisphere of blinking red anti-collision lights at night. It's a fucking aesthetic travesty, all for the stupid notion that wind power will somehow ever serve more than a tiny fraction of our energy needs.

[Seth]

Is there anything relevant for Seth?

Truth, Justice and the American Way!

[JimC]

Seth wrote:

...And since you can't store "renewable energy" like wind and sunshine it will never be able to meet the demand...

Betraying a deep ignorance of modern technology, here...

[rasetsu]

https://www.skepticalscience.com/human- ... ssions.htm

As you can see in Figure 1, natural land and ocean carbon remains roughly in balance and have done so for a long time – and we know this because we can measure historic levels of CO2 in the atmosphere both directly (in ice cores) and indirectly (through proxies).

Figure 1: Global carbon cycle.



Numbers represent flux of carbon dioxide in gigatons (Source: Figure 7.3, IPCC AR4).

But consider what happens when more CO2 is released from outside of the natural carbon cycle – by burning fossil fuels. Although our output of 29 gigatons of CO2 is tiny compared to the 750 gigatons moving through the carbon cycle each year, it adds up because the land and ocean cannot absorb all of the extra CO2. About 40% of this additional CO2 is absorbed. The rest remains in the atmosphere, and as a consequence, atmospheric CO2 is at its highest level in 15 to 20 million years (Tripati 2009). (A natural change of 100ppm normally takes 5,000 to 20,000 years. The recent increase of 100ppm has taken just 120 years).

Human CO2 emissions upset the natural balance of the carbon cycle. Man-made CO2 in the atmosphere has increased by a third since the pre-industrial era, creating an artificial forcing of global temperatures which is warming the planet. While fossil-fuel derived CO2 is a very small component of the global carbon cycle, the extra CO2 is cumulative because the natural carbon exchange cannot absorb all the additional CO2.

[JimC]

As an additional small but important effect, we have also increased the concentrations of other Greenhouse gases such as methane...

[Brian Peacock]

Actually, some parts of the private sector, for instance those involved in manufacturing solar cells or wind turbines, or those involved in insurance are totally on board...

Only because the government subsidizes their industries with massive amounts of taxpayer money, without which they would cease to exist almost immediately, which completely eliminates them as free market participants.

Just like the defense sector.

[JimC]

Actually, some parts of the private sector, for instance those involved in manufacturing solar cells or wind turbines, or those involved in insurance are totally on board...

Only because the government subsidizes their industries with massive amounts of taxpayer money, without which they would cease to exist almost immediately, which completely eliminates them as free market participants.

Just like the defense sector.

It's all the fucking government's fault! If only it would allow private citizens to buy tanks, mortars, howitzers and jet fighters, there would be a healthy free market!

[pErvinalia]

The ultimate free market would be no nation states and a one world government. Welcome to democratic socialism, Seth and 42!

[piscator]

Just the bustle and flow of interstate commerce! It's a wonder no one has thought of that before!

[Seth]

The ultimate free market would be no nation states and a one world government. Welcome to democratic socialism, Seth and 42!

Free markets don't care about nation states, but they are negatively affected by governments, so if a one-world government is powerless to interfere with the free markets to pick economic winners and losers to achieve social goals, which is the antithesis of democratic socialism, that would be fine. Unfortunately government, like fire, is extremely dangerous and must be kept in check and very small, lest it rage out of control and destroy everything and everyone.

[pErvinalia]

Ok, utopian communism then!

[Seth]

Actually, some parts of the private sector, for instance those involved in manufacturing solar cells or wind turbines, or those involved in insurance are totally on board...

Only because the government subsidizes their industries with massive amounts of taxpayer money, without which they would cease to exist almost immediately, which completely eliminates them as free market participants.

Just like the defense sector.

It's all the fucking government's fault! If only it would allow private citizens to buy tanks, mortars, howitzers and jet fighters, there would be a healthy free market!

Actually, the US government does allow private citizens to buy such things if they want, if they can find one, and if they can afford it. Just pay a $200 tax on the transfer of certain Class III items and fill out some paperwork and you too can own a Panzer...or a machine gun...or a howitzer.

That's because the 2nd Amendment prohibits the government from infringing on the right to keep and bear "arms," a category all of the above fall into.

[Seth]

Ok, utopian communism then!

No, communism is the concept that nobody owns anything and the state owns everything, which is still the antithesis of a free market. Private property is the cornerstone of any market, and especially a free market.

But then you know that and are merely trolling, as usual.