We are developing the social individualist meta-context for the future. From the very serious to the extremely frivolous... lets see what is on the mind of the Samizdata people.

Samizdata, derived from Samizdat /n. - a system of clandestine publication of banned literature in the USSR [Russ.,= self-publishing house]

Samizdata quote of the day

“One of the few sensible things Noam Chomsky ever said was that if you want to understand the world, read the New York Times backwards; that is, start at the end of the story and read up.”

Steven F Hayward, making this comment in a long and damning critique of “climate crisis” viewpoints and suppressors of dissent.

(Thanks to Instapundit for the pointer.)

The sheer dishonesty of it all

The Lancet published the chart on left with a different X-Axis to downplay fact that cold causes ten times more deaths than heat in Europe. Björn Lomborg corrected that with the chart on right.

Samizdata quote of the day – a new rent-seeking class

“How many environmental justice majors does it take to calculate the CO2 emissions of a light bulb? This isn’t a joke. Businesses now employ scads of college grads to do this. For years America’s political class has lamented that too many college grads are working in low-paying jobs that don’t require post-secondary degrees. The diversity, equity and inclusion and environmental, social and governance industries—DEI and ESG, respectively—are solving for this problem while creating many others. In the modern progressive era, young graduates are finding remunerative employment as sustainability coordinators, DEI officers and “people partners.” Instead of serving up pumpkin soy lattes, they’re quantifying corporate greenhouse gas emissions and ensuring employers don’t transgress progressive cultural orthodoxies.”

Allysia Finley, Wall Street Journal ($).

A Lamborghini tractor at the gates of Downing Street

“If we don’t learn from the Dutch eco quagmire we might end up with Farmer Clarkson as PM”, warns the Times.

Jeremy Clarkson is a bit too much of a Remainer for my political tastes, but we could do a lot worse. But Robert Colvile’s article is not really about Britain’s most famous petrolhead. It is about the slow but relentless growth in the scope of a law for which nobody voted, Council Directive 92/43/EEC on the Conservation of natural habitats and of wild fauna and flora, a.k.a. the “EU Habitats Directive”.

This was designed to protect and restore rare species and conservation sites. One thing they needed protecting from was nitrogen pollution.

In November 2018 the European Court of Justice ruled (after a referral from the Netherlands) that any “plans or projects” near such sites were permissible only if there was “no reasonable scientific doubt as to the lack of adverse effects”.

In other words, before you could build a house or spread fertiliser on a field, you had to prove it would not increase nitrogen emissions. Which you couldn’t.

This ruling — known as the “Dutch case” — triggered the nutrient neutrality crisis, which is blocking an estimated 145,000 new homes in England.

But in the Netherlands the results were even more dramatic. The country’s highest court quickly suspended 18,000 construction projects and ordered drastic cuts in nitrogen emissions. Given that 46 per cent came from cow dung, MPs proposed halving the number of cattle. Which led to outraged farmers blockading roads with tractors, and the formation of a new party, the Farmer-Citizen Movement. Which is now well ahead in the polls.

As the article points out, Brexit has not prized the UK loose from these laws, although it has made it less inconceivable that one day we might be.

Above all, this story illustrates the dangers of the precautionary principle at the heart of EU law, and in particular our interpretation of it. This principle holds that before you do anything, it must be proved to be absolutely safe.

In the nitrogen ruling, the language about “no reasonable scientific doubt” set an extraordinarily high bar. One that drove Natural England to unilaterally halt the construction of 145,000 desperately needed houses across 74 council areas, because there was a risk of nitrogen from flushed lavatories running into rivers — even though planning permission had already been granted, and the homes would be responsible for only a fraction of local pollution.

What’s striking is the absolute nature of such decisions. There is no evaluation of trade-offs, no way to argue that, yes, we need to protect rivers, but also to build homes and fill bellies with crops. The Economist notes that the Netherlands’ environmental rules have imposed “wide-ranging restrictions on new economic activity”. Same here.

For many Brexit campaigners, the hostility to innovation embedded in the precautionary principle — for nitrogen emissions, read gene-editing, or AI — was a key justification for leaving. But the poison has entered our bloodstream.

Samizdata quote of the day

“Switching transport to electric in a short timescale will inevitably mean buying Chinese. Are we really about to force ourselves to become even more reliant on a totalitarian regime that stamps out freedom in Hong Kong, commits genocide against the Uighurs, threatens war on Taiwan and refuses to be transparent about how a pandemic began near its leading virus laboratory?”

Matt Ridley.

I want it on record that I deplored the theft of the banner. Thanks to me it doesn’t have a single plore left.

Just Stop Oil march gets hijacked by stag-do leaving protesters furious

Video courtesy of the Daily Mail via Instapundit.

The Mail writer reveals an unexpected talent for understatement:

The demonstrators are then seen continuing their march, looking displeased.

Samizdata quote of the day – Heresy must be suppressed

The cancellation of eminent science writers and statisticians like Dr. Whitehouse and Professor Fenton for ‘wrongthink’ highlights the ever-shrinking boundaries of the discourse around science and medicine and the unwillingness of science’s gatekeepers to challenge groupthink and politically sensitive dogmas. As Dr. Whitehouse says, “science thrives on debate and scrutiny”. Silencing those who challenge prevailing orthodoxies was the approach favoured by the Catholic church in 17th Century Italy and is completely at odds with the scientific method.

Richard Eldred.

I used to read every issue of New Scientist ‘back in the day’ but it has been a bastion of approved high-status groupthink for many years, suitable for cat tray liner only.

World ends today

Will someone please ask the Swedish Doom Goblin if I have time for another Armagnac?

Samizdata quote of the day – the cult of net zero

But grinding poverty is, so far as ministers are concerned, a price worth paying for the cult of net zero. Few independent experts pretend that either solar power or wind power are remotely adequate for the needs of heating and powering a country of approaching 70 million people. We are facing this serious crisis because of the demented opposition to nuclear power that has taken root in the last 20 years – a bacillus that entered the Conservative Party’s bloodstream with the leadership of Dave Cameron – and a chronic determination to make promises about improving our environmental record that would undermine the economy of any advanced country that relies on the generation of electricity, the heating of buildings and water and, of course, on moving people and goods around from A to B.

Simon Heffer

Climate change story told by ice cores…

A short but important presentation by Jørgen Peder Steffensen …

What do ice cores tell us about the history of climate change and the present trend? This video explains one perspective – arguably the most accurate one. And if you skip to 2:25, you will see the huge error we have made and the assumptions and extrapolations based on that error.

‘Government insulation scheme ruined my home’

‘Government insulation scheme ruined my home’ is the headline of this BBC piece about a man who says his flat has been ruined by black mould caused by a government “green” insulation scheme. The words “insulation” and “home” could be replaced by many other words and the headline would still hold.

Although the piece describes Blaan Paterson as a “homeowner”, it seems from the text that his ex-council flat is still under the control of South Lanarkshire Council to some extent. He insists he was signed up to the Universal Home Insulation Scheme (UHIS) in 2011 without his consent.

Things done by governments to people without their consent often turn out badly.

Things done by governments for people who grab them with both hands under the impression that they are getting a free benefit often turn out badly, too. “Don’t look a gift horse in the mouth”, goes the proverb. Buyers have an incentive to think carefully about whether a proposed purchase is wise before they commit their money. Recipients of free stuff don’t. The incentives on government contractors not to think about whether insulation is right for a particular property are also strong.

Tom Woolley, a semi-retired professor of architecture, has been highlighting “cavity wall insulation disasters” for a number of years.

He has also advised pressure group Cavity Insulation Victims’ Alliance (CIVALLI), which has given evidence at the UK Parliament and Welsh Assembly.

He told BBC Scotland: “The problem with filling up the cavity either with glass fibre and perhaps, to a lesser extent, polystyrene is that it stops the building ‘breathing’.

“Vapour collecting in the building or dampness that gets into the walls can’t escape because it’s blocked up by this stuff.

“It tends to lead to dampness and mould inside the houses. We have plenty of evidence of this. I would say there are hundreds of thousands of examples of this throughout the UK.”

Samizdata quote of the day – heat pump edition

Oh, how we wish the laws of thermodynamics could be altered, in our favour.

Air-source heat pumps, which included the “mini-splits” popular in warmer climates, will provide less and less heat, the colder it gets outside, and less and less cooling, the warmer it gets outside. And in both cases, will use more and more electricity to produce less and less heating or cooling, as the outside temperature rises or falls, respectively – if you see what I mean. In other words, the more you need them, the less effective and efficient they are – the perfect government solution. You couldn’t make it up.

– Commenter llamas accurately describing the lunacy of heat pumps, which really are the perfect analogy for government: the more you need them, the less effective and efficient they are.