Ben Shapiro’s Climate Change Misdirection: What he’s LYING About

Let’s discuss how conservative Ben Shapiro will talk about climate change, appeal to authority then leave out key information.

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Timestamps:
0:00 Coming Up
0:21 Intro
1:15 Models Are Wrong?
1:38 50% Really?
2:48 Sea Water Rise
3:22 Expensive Stuff
4:27 Ben Loves Carbon Taxes
5:01 Nordhaus Never Said That
6:45 Carbon Taxes are Great
7:03 Ben on Lex
8:11 Natural Gas Money
8:33 China and India
8:57 The Lies Don’t Stop
9:31 Closing

Original Video: https://youtu.be/wRk1p8Lzwvo?si=qRwZf8Vy2nMSmesh
Lex Video: https://youtu.be/vOblAlOifpo?si=4hrrIX1uhkcC0TLp

References:
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3. FAQ: What do volcanoes have to do with climate change? Climate Change: Vital Signs of the Planet https://climate.nasa.gov/faq/42/what-do-volcanoes-have-to-do-with-climate-change.
4. Climate Change: Global Sea Level | NOAA Climate.gov. http://www.climate.gov/news-features/understanding-climate/climate-change-global-sea-level.
5. Climate change and its consequences | Munich Re. https://www.munichre.com/en/risks/climate-change.html.
6. Ben Shapiro vs. Facts: How Wrong Is He About Climate Change? (2023).
7. Barrage, L. & Nordhaus, W. POLICIES, PROJECTIONS, AND THE SOCIAL COST OF CARBON: RESULTS FROM THE DICE-2023 MODEL.
8. William Nordhaus versus the United Nations on Climate Change Economics. Econlib https://www.econlib.org/library/Columns/y2018/MurphyNordhaus.html.
9. The Sveriges Riksbank Prize in Economic Sciences in Memory of Alfred Nobel 2018. NobelPrize.org https://www.nobelprize.org/prizes/economic-sciences/2018/summary/.
10. Nordhaus, W. D. To Slow or Not to Slow: The Economics of The Greenhouse Effect. The Economic Journal 101, 920 (1991).
11. Ken Rice on X: ‘@RichardTol @Graham_Caswell @ProfSteveKeen @cwhope @blair_fix @Limits2Growth @nephologue Can I just clarify. Are you actually suggesting that a 10K rise in global average surface temperature would be manageable?’ / X. X (formerly Twitter) https://twitter.com/theresphysics/status/1140661721633308673 (2019).
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13. A closer examination of the fantastical numbers in Bjorn Lomborg’s new book. Grantham Research Institute on climate change and the environment https://www.lse.ac.uk/granthaminstitute/news/a-closer-examination-of-the-fantastical-numbers-in-bjorn-lomborgs-new-book/.
14. White, C. Environmentalist accused of scientific dishonesty. BMJ 326, 120 (2003).
15. Metcalf, G. E. & Stock, J. H. The Macroeconomic Impact of Europe’s Carbon Taxes. American Economic Journal: Macroeconomics 15, 265–286 (2020).
16. En-ROADS Climate Scenario. https://en-roads.climateinteractive.org/scenario.html.
17. Eldardiry, H. & Habib, E. Carbon capture and sequestration in power generation: review of impacts and opportunities for water sustainability. Energy, Sustainability and Society 8, 6 (2018).
18. 2023 Levelized Cost Of Energy+. https://www.lazard.com https://www.lazard.com/research-insights/2023-levelized-cost-of-energyplus/.
19. Renewable Power Generation Costs in 2022. https://www.irena.org/Publications/2023/Aug/Renewable-Power-Generation-Costs-in-2022 (2023).
20. Enabling a True 24/7 Carbon-Free Resource Portfolio for Great River Energy with Multi-Day Storage. https://formenergy.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/04/24-7-Carbon-Free-Resource-Portfolio-4.24.23.pdf.
21. Steinke, F., Wolfrum, P. & Hoffmann, C. Grid vs. storage in a 100% renewable Europe. Renewable Energy 50, 826–832 (2013).
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25. China to lead global renewable growth with record installations- Woodmac. Reuters (2023).
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It will not lead to reduction in carbon emissions in developing countries for another 10 to 15 years including places like China well that comment just aged like milk didn’t it he’s right that signing papers don’t do anything but actions do like implementing a carbon tax you know Ben I too love capitalism

So I’m sure that you’ll agree with me that America should Implement a nationwide $40 per ton carbon tax just as a start I agree with Ben or not he’s generally considered a reasonable conservative to many people this video will show his subversion on the climate change discussion for a topic he’s

Clearly read a great deal about but has decided to play politics rather than be honest with the details uh my question is about climate change so if I remember correctly I I heard you once say in a video that you do believe that human activity does have some sort of U effect

On the climate so one I would just like you to explain a little bit of your understanding of climate change sure and another question is are there any government policies that you would support in terms to mitigate carbon emissions at um yeah okay so uh the so my perspective on climate change is

Number one I’m not a climatologist but accepting the ipcc reports you have to take into account the fact that modeling has been wrong for 20 to 30 years it’s always been overestimating the amount of climate change that’s actually taken place so no modeling has actually been pretty accurate and we’ve only been

Getting better at it here’s a study showing the modeling accuracy for the last few decades generally it’s pretty good and this is where we start to see the subversion but virtually every reputable scientist including folks who are who are called Skeptics believe that the climate is warming there’s an

Argument about as to how much and that over 50% of that warming is probably attributable to human activity now 50% Ben where’s where’s that number coming from who are these climate scientists that are arguing about this I’m I’m honestly curious where this 50% number comes from I tried to track it down I

Have no idea what he’s talking about the closest thing I’ve seen is a poll showing 50% of Americans believe in climate change but that’s not really irrelevant because we care about what’s true not what people think is true if anybody knows what talking about please send me a link uh because for all

Intents and purposes it’s 100% you might be able to marginally say 98 99% when we’re looking at volcano’s contribution but for all practical purposes anthropogenic climate change is 100% human caused that raises other questions which is okay so let’s say the Earth is warming what kind of damage is that

Actually going to do and this is a serious question right let’s say that the Earth is warming and we’re causing it does that mean that it’s the day after tomorrow and massive floods in New York and qu running around with Jake gyen Hall trying to avoid the freeze no

It doesn’t right it means that over the course of the next 100 years that the water level is going to rise a a rather predictable number of inches or feet and then humans will migrate based on those weather patterns as humans have done since human beings became human beings

And started walking on two feet uh so you know I’m I’m a little Ben most people in the world live near water so just moving alone would incur huge costs related to infrastructure and having to rebuild or or move large houses more sanguin about the possibility of

Long-term climate change than a lot of the catastrophists who seem to assume that there’s going to be tremendous damage done all the talk for example about the storms are becoming that more severe and they’re they’re doing that much more damage the statistics really don’t back that up what they really back

Up is that we’re just building more stuff in the path of hurricanes that we’re building more expensive stuff in the path of hurricanes and so when the storms break that stuff then it’s more expensive for us to fix that stuff yeah Ben because we mostly live near water nevertheless more expensive stuff means

More economic damage hence why insurance companies been taking climate change into account since at least the 1970s while I was researching for this video another Channel called all about climate actually did a video about Ben’s claims here so I’ll send you a link to that I

Think I can add a little bit more context around the economics of climate change because he goes into a little bit more of the technicality of it but he debunks many of the claims that Ben makes here specifically regarding the Hurricanes because the number of hurricanes actually hasn’t changed

Marketly over time uh and when folks say the intensity of hurricanes has changed what they really mean is that the amount of cost associated with the hurricane exchange uh as far as what should be done about that well the biggest problem that you have is a serious Collective

Action problem let’s assume that you really think that there’s a huge problem you still have to decide whether you believe what let’s put it this way what level of climate change requires what level of cutbacks in terms of the global economy so the F there’s a a fellow

Whose Name Escapes Me Right Now who just won the Nobel prize in economics who legitimately made his ENT entire career out of studying the economics of climate when does he think that certainly has to be talking about the climate modeler William nordos he’s been advocating for a price on carbon for decades using

Nordos models that’s approximately 40 USD per ton I’m sure Ben is going to say that the solution is then carbon taxing since he’s appealing to this Authority correct intervention economically is called for he says that until he believes that over the next Century there’s 3.5 degre Centigrade of climate

Change that intervention actually would be counterproductive it would cost more to intervene than it would to actually allow that damage take place and just cope with it because the what the nordos definitely did not say that rather he looked at the optimal economic case for damage versus abatement and

What carbon taxes should be implemented within that time frame I disagree strongly with Nas’s assessment but if he’s going to appeal to this Authority he at least needs to be honest with what that Authority is providing him nordos has always been Pro carbon tax and nordos only used that three and A2 Dee

Optimal case as 3 and 1/2 de should be the temperature that we target as we weigh the economic costs and and systems but a carbon tax has always underpinned that some fun facts about Nord hos though he did win the Nobel Prize for climate modeling but there’s a very

Specific caveat to this that his prize was for his contribution to the methodology and not for the conclusions that he came to as when you make different assumptions than him using the same models you get dramatically different results nordos assumed that because 90% of jobs were indoors they’d

Be unaffected by climate change other economists contemporaries that agree with n have said things as stupid as we’ll just live indoors like the Saudis I’ll explore the economics of climate change modeling in future videos it’s going to take me a while to congregate all that information and nordos is going

To underpin a lot of that but for now just know that nordos is generally the low end of the damage climate modeling and metal analyses on these subjects show much higher results this is why like bjor lomberg are accused of cherry-picking because if you want to downplay climate change you’ll pick the

One guy that agrees with you and not the vast array of economic modeling that shows a different result and basically destroys the entire conservative premise on not doing anything econom is going to continue to grow over time uh so I I don’t see any reason why I think that I

Would know better than he does um it’s also a basic fact that the only countries that have really been abiding by any of the the so the economy will grow good thing studies are showing that carbon taxes and green indry are generally good for the economy either maintaining economic Prosperity or

Increasing it though in all fairness Ben’s video is a little older and the data showing Renewables as cheaper technology is a little bit more Rec oh wait he says the stuff unlikes Freeman’s podcast about a year ago I would say the truth is for for years and years I’ve

Belied that climate change was a reality and that anthropogenic climate change is a reality I don’t argue with the ipcc estimates I know climatologists at places like MIT or Cal Tech and they know this up better than I do so you know the the notion that climate change

Is just not happening or that human beings have not contributed to climate change I find doubtful the question is to what extent human beings are contributing to climate change 50% is it 70% is it 90% I think there’s a little bit more play in the joints there so

It’s not totally clear and the reality is that we’re going to have to accept at least 1.5 degrees Celsius of climate change is baked into the cake by the end of the century again not me talking William nous The Economist which just the stuff talking what you’ll see is a

Gradual change of living people will move away from areas that are inated on the coast you’ll see people building seaw walls you’ll see people adapting new technologies to Su carbon out of the a you will see geoengineering this is the sort of stuff that we should be

Focused on and the sort of bizarre focus on what if we just keep tossing hundreds of billions of dollars at the same three Technologies over and over in the hopes that if we subsidize it this will magically make it more efficient I’ve seen no evidence whatsoever that that is

That is going to be the way that we get ourselves out of this necessity being the mother invention I think human beings will adapt because we have adapted and we will continue to adapt so to the degree we invest in the threat of this it should be into policies that

Help with the adaptation versus the mitigation right sea walls geoengineering developing Technologies carbon out of the air no evidence yes you haven’t looked very hard Renewables are taking over across Europe adaptation is great we’re going to need to do it but it comes with a cost I for one

Prefer lower power costs I have no idea why Ben might not be in favor of cheap renewable energy nope no idea at all attempts to reduce climate change have been extraordinarily developed countries developing countries have no interest in sacrificing their own people at the altar of climate change and the number

One reducer in admissions over the past year was actually the United States I the United States pulls out of the Paris Accords so China and India are actually leading the charge of Renewables now since they’re cheaper and they help with energy Independence I won’t knock him for that since we’re looking a little

Bit more recent data now than when this video was made what does solv climate change is technological progress uh and technological progress has led to a reduction in carbon emissions in the United States it will not lead to a reduction in carbon emissions in developing countries for another 10 to

15 years including places like China well that comment just stage like milk didn’t it he’s right that signing papers don’t do anything but actions do like implementing a carbon Tax Technology is great glad we invented solar and wind because it’s cheaper than our existing fossil fuel Fleet the conservative

Talking points are starting to fall through the cracks it’s going to become harder and harder to deny all of this information so it’s it’s a complex issue and all the folks are basically like let’s just kill capitalism and good luck with that you know Ben I too love

Capitalism so I’m sure that you’ll agree with me that America should Implement a nationwide $40 per ton carbon tax just as a start anyway thank you for watching as always all of the references will be in the description and let me know down below if there’s anything else you’d like me to cover