Detailed Summary of the article Relflections on the Economics by Essay

Detailed Summary of the article Relflections on the Economics by William D. Nordhaus - Essay Example He emphasis the importance of "global change" and the "threat of green house warming" which is taking place at a rapid speed all over the world. The approach is ideal because instead of jumping to conclusion, he explores the issue of green house warming and its impact on the world. The "Green house effect" part is given more space than required, which could have been avoided, as writing two paragraphs just to define the Green House effect is too much, especially if the audience are scientists, and are knowledgeable about the topic. Even the second paragraph seems a bit out of space, the better approach would have to combine two paragraphs, into one paragraph and add only the importance part relevant to the topic, such as "concentration of CO2" in the atmosphere. The figure1" projection of global temperature increase" is an excellent way to show the scale of the problem; the readers can easily see scale of the problem. The figure shows two hundred years change (1900 to 2100), which is enough time to see the visible changes in the climate. It clearly shows, how the temperature has increased over the time and how much it will f urther increase. However he counters the argument of dooms day prediction with his own model and mentions that it is not exactly possible to predict the climatic conditions as the scientists have claimed in their model. The reason he mentions is that climatic model depends on economic models, and slower economies and higher fuel prices will decrease the emission of gases in the atmosphere. And another reason against the climatic catastrophe is that "climate flips from one locally stable equilibrium to another" and it is not possible for climatologist at present to exactly predict what will happen, unless they come up with bigger and exhaustive models. The writer moves to "Impacts of the Climate Change" and mentions that two centuries ago man was highly dependent on day and light timing, but technology has changed he slavery to natural timing and now man is no longer dependent for his economic and agricultural needs upon natural environment. He provides solid arguments by mentioning the case of a business firm which wish to start business is not concerned about climate, even if the difference is as great as Moscow and Hong Kong (Moscow has an extreme cold temperature, while Hong Kong is an island and has mild temperature). The contrast is purposely mentioned to give the readers an idea of difference in temperature and making a business decision (Economic activity). The reason for such change is technology, which has enabled man to overcome the climatic difference and work in all kind of environments. He brings another arguments against the impact of climatic change, by mentioning the factors, such as precipitation, draughts, and natural disasters, which often have "socioeconomic impact" yet ignored by scientists. Normally scientists mention only temperature as a main factor to be influenced by climate for the reason that it is an easy way to refer to the climatic change. In reality this approach is flawed and more generic and is ignoring the impact of climate on the less developed countries of the world. Thus the conclusion is that the climatic prediction does not portray a full picture of the problem nor does it provide sufficient information as predicted by the scientists. The author does