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Dana1981 works (ed) for Tetra Tech. His brand of nonsense / nonscience was all over that article. Is C asking Dana for proof? That would be the day. He only asks for proof of the obvious while believing the dubious.
Our society, our 'western' way of life, our global economy is built on one fundamental assumption - as production quantities increase, costs decrease. This is no longer true of fossil fuels. We can build more and more gas and coal fired power stations, but this does not decrease the cost of their operation.
As we've grown our economies, our demand for power has increased, and we have had to grow our energy production capacity. Fossil fuels become a limiting factor since the costs will rise over time. We have to grow our economies faster than the increase in fossil fuel costs. And if we grow our economies by building an increasing number of fossil fuel power plants, then that also now costs us more.
The issue, for me, isn't about numbers of people saved or killed in the past. The issue is how we continue to grow economies using a fuel source that becomes more, not less, expensive as time goes on.
It is likely that the technology we developed using fossil fuels has, over the years, saved a lot of lives (though it's also cost a lot of lives, how many people have died in car crashes, for example?)
But the question is not "is this technology better than none at all?", but "is this technology the best currently available?" And the answer to that one, for internal combustion engines, is a resounding "no" at this point.
If there are fewer, or no, internal combustion engine cars on our roads, then there will be less pollution (leaving aside CO2, think VOCs, soot, NOx, ground level ozone, and the like) in our cities. If we reduce the amount of those things in our air, we will have fewer health problems related to breathing that crap.
In other words, this article isn't saying "fossil fuels are evil and have cost a lot of lives, so we should never have used them", it's saying "electric cars are better for our health than fossil-fuel powered cars, so we should use them instead, even without considering global warming"...
is it *that* hard to understand that maybe there are better solutions out there than What We've Always Done?
No mistake about it the writer is a fool. But even a fool is believed by some. It falls under the category of a big lie.
The theory of the Big Lie was succinctly expounded by Adolf Hitler, an acknowledged master of the genre. Here is what Der Führer wrote in vol. I, Chapter 10 of Mein Kampf (in James Murphy' translation):
"...in the big lie there is always a certain force of credibility; because the broad masses of a nation are always more easily corrupted in the deeper strata of their emotional nature than consciously or voluntarily; and thus in the primitive simplicity of their minds they more readily fall victims to the big lie than the small lie, since they themselves often tell small lies in little matters but would be ashamed to resort to large-scale falsehoods. It would never come into their heads to fabricate colossal untruths, and they would not believe that others could have the impudence to distort the truth so infamously. Even though the facts which prove this to be so may be brought clearly to their minds, they will still doubt and waver and will continue to think that there may be some other explanation. For the grossly impudent lie always leaves traces behind it, even after it has been nailed down, a fact which is known to all expert liars in this world and to all who conspire together in the art of lying."
The greenies have take the lie even farther than Hitler would have ever imagined.
What deaths are you talking about? The article has nothing to do with your question so there is no reason the writer should have considered it. The article merely highlights possible future health benefits. It has nothing to do with the historic social benefits/costs of fossil fuels.
Maybe you should take some classes in reading – especially classes for people for whom English is not their native language.
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jim z -
Tetra Tech is an international engineering firm with over 300 offices in 19 countries and over 40 US states, and that owns a dozen subsidiaries. Maybe you should try visiting the reality-based world sometime.
Problem is that electric cars pollute more then gasoline burning cars. The pollution is distributed elsewhere not to mention the losses in electric power over the transmission lines make them far less efficient.
Exaggeration is the only thing liberals can do to get people to listen. Questioning the flaws in their logic takes you even further into a nonsensical reality where evil corporation our using mind control to make us destroy the planet. Point to reality and ask them to observe. The failures their ideas have brought about and you get excuses of how we didn't try enough, didn't spend enough, or more conspiracies about evil corporations cock blocking their ideas.
playing games with numbers does not justify the means
Is human life the only important life?
I read the article. It cracked me up......thanks for the chuckle!
http://finance.yahoo.com/news/forget-saving-planet-driving-electric-182114654.html
Any energy source will save lives will kill very few if any people. Natural gas and coal more harmful than nuclear power
http://www.giss.nasa.gov/research/briefs...
Proof?????????????????????????????
It has made millions of peoples lives more comfortable but actual proof
