Arguing whether humans cause climate instability, as a political issue, is a distraction.

In response to an Al Jazeera story about climate change:

Any political discussion of climate change ought to be within the context of an explicit recognition of a primary function of government: to manage environmental impacts in a way consistent with the will of the people. We should have rates of taking of resources and of putting pollution that do not exceed what most people would say is acceptable.

This needs to be our starting point. What does a random survey say? Should we have faster extraction of resources? Or slower? Or are we using things up at about the right rate?

Slower taking of resources would mean an easier transition for society (and easier for individuals) because resource availability will be extended farther into the future. There will be more time to learn to adapt to their absence.

The conversation about whether humans are causing climate instability can continue after we assess a fee to carbon and methane emissions, high enough to keep emissions within acceptable limits in the eyes of most people, and give the proceeds to all the world's people.

As citizens, it is our shared responsibility to see to it that our political system functions so as to manage this natural wealth in a way that reflects our will and also in a way that reflects our shared vestment in this wealth. We need to attend to the functioning of the political system, or to its replacement, to ensure that the *economic* system reflects a shared ownership of natural resource wealth. When the economy reflects a shared ownership of air and water and other natural resources, abject poverty across the world will no longer exist. (Natural wealth is estimated to be worth about $33 trillion per year. That's about $10 or $20 per day, per person, even if we cut or cut out other taxes and have each person spend a portion of their share of this 'natural resource wealth dividend' toward public programs that most people agree provide a valuable public service.)

'Economic externalities' are what economists call those hidden costs, like pollution and resource depletion, that are not usually part of the cost-benefit analysis. These costs can and must be taken into account. There needs to be a willingness on the part of reporters and editors to start reporting on the various forms of externalities, on their consequences, and on various ways of accounting for them. We'll particularly need to look at which ways of accounting for externalities are most efficient and fair.