The discussion in class last Tuesday focused on the allocation of resources toward global problems in our contemporary society. If the world were to suddenly create 50 billion more dollars, without worry of inflation, what would we spend it on? What is the most efficient way to go about using the money to solve a universal issue?
In the lecture we read/listened to, the man seemed to give credence to the theory that it would be better to use that money toward abolishing hunger in the world's developing nations, or using it to fight an epidemic like AIDS. Certainly these are noble causes, but he seemed to brush off the threat of global warming as unimportant and irrelevant. Perhaps hunger/poverty issues should take precedent over global warming, as no one really ever died over global warming. However, if it is a global inheritance of this money, shouldn't the funds be used to fight an issue that affects those in Switzerland as well as those in Swaziland? I'm pretty sure bioterrorism isn't a majorly pertinent issue in those nations, but the threat of global warming doesn't know borders.
Investing in a "Manhattan Project" of the 21st century could help spark initiative in the world to pay more attention to green technology. We could save our planet and secure our economic security for decades to come.
Poverty can't be solved, and to be honest terrorism can't theoretically be solved either. However, global warming can only be solved in a subjective light. We can't all agree even at this time that climate change is real, and much less whether it is man-made or merely natural. Perhaps funding should be put aside for the advocation of global warming measures, since a great segment of the population (including an alarming number of people in our class) still believe global warming to be a false prophecy of the future.
I'll actually quote a Republican to finish this reflection. Before he began his run to the right in order to get re-elected, Senator John McCain noted this about global warming in a debate between his Republican counterparts during the presidential campaign:
"If it's real, then we can help save ourselves from a global disaster. If it's not, then all we've done is left our children and our grandchildren with a cleaner world."
Maybe we should just have some tax cuts? 50 billion dollars could give every person in the world about $8.15. Pretty sweet deal.
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ReplyDeleteI believe Lomborg makes a compelling case for where the money should be allocated. Like Angelica said in class, hunger and diseases are killing people today, while global warming won’t kill people for presumably a long time. It’s like saying we should build a bomb shelter for an attack that might never come. It is strange to put it into words, but the lives of people today are more important than the lives of people in the future.
ReplyDeleteI disagree with you that countries like Switzerland find global warming a much bigger threat than bioterrorism. Bioterrorism knows no borders. If bioterrorists created a deadly disease that spreads rapidly from person to person, the entire world would be affected. However, bioterrorism might never happen; global warming most likely will hurt us. In the end, we might have to spread the money around after all. So if something bad happens, we could just say “Hey, at least we tried.”
Mario, I have to disagree with your suggestion to "spread the money around." Personally, I believe in quality over quantity and by spreading our resources too thin, it is likely that at most very little will improve. Whether or not we can agree on a defined list of priorities should not hinder us from coming to a consensus of some kind and tackling the vast array of social, environmental, economic, and political issues one at a time.
ReplyDeleteAnd in response to your bomb shelter analogy: would it not be more effective to take measures to prevent a plane from dropping a bomb before the threat clearly materializes rather than attempting to build a shelter of questionable integrity after the bomb is dropped?