"Financial security helps, granted, but if it doesn't buy happiness by itself, then sacrificing more important things like self-respect for financial gain is a bit like selling your car's engine to buy a bigger, more powerful stereo system."

If you have financial security, one will have the time to do whatever he desires to find happiness. Self-respect is only lost when one holds himself to standards he knows he can't meet: so just don't hold ypurself to standards and you will have no trouble at all securing self-respect.

"I'll ignore the craven cowardice of declaring the argument over as soon as one has made one's point, giving no opportunity for rebuttal. I would be very interested to see the sources behind your opinion here. Mine is that I work for a company specializing in air pollution research and control policies and I find myself dealing with some of the data for this on a fairly frequent basis, in addition to reading on the subject and conversations with my boss, who is among the world's foremost experts on vehicle emissions. The view that we are contributing to a severe acceleration of the rate of long-term climate change is extremely well-supported; those taking the opposite position I have found to be invariably either thoroughly ignorant or in thrall to industrial and political interests opposed to responsible environmental policy for purely selfish reasons."

Cowardly? I attempted to end a circular discussion before one began! But if you insist on it, I'll go with it.

Firstly, just take a geology course. You might hear of periods in earth's history known as "ice ages" (yes, there were more than just one). These were brought on by fluctuating temperatures on the earth: sometimes due to natural greenhouse gas emisions, other times through impact with a celestial object. But the result was the same- earth freezes, most lifeforms die, earth warms again, and the survivors replentish the earth and evolve. Shit like this has been going on before mankind even evolved, so there is no reason to assume that we (as a species) are responsible for it.

Secondly, despite what you wrote to Padishah, you DO have an interest in this matter: your polution company must paint up polution to be as dangerous as posible so other firms would be motivated to hire companies like yours to control pollution (I know how marketing works). I admit that pollution is hazardous (it can cause smog, TB, various cancers, etc...), but to suggest that it's responsible for the phenomenea of global warming (a natural proccess) is scare-mongering. The unsuspecting public might buy into it, but I don't.

"But even assuming you're right, let's try a thought experiment:

Suppose we were physically in the same room, having this argument, and I were to pull out a pistol and put a bullet between your eyes. By your apparent reasoning here, that would be "all right", meaning that, if not necessarily moral or desirable, it's not a cause for concern or something that should be opposed. After all, you're going to die anyway, someday. By shooting you, I would just be hastening an already existing process. Yet somehow, I imagine you'd find this to be a very unappealing and undesirable prospect. I invite you to consider the implications of this."

It's funny you should use such an example: some time back, an arrogant young man did threaten me with a weapon. He surprised me from behind and attempted to put a knife at my throat (he used a pitiful hold: he didn't even go under my arm) and demanded my wallet. I grabbed his knife hand with my right hand and plunged my left elbow into his ribs, then spun around (still holding his knife hand) and thrust his own knife into his chest. He staggered away clutching his wound; whether or not he survived that injury I neither know nor care.

If (hypothetically) you attempted to pull a gun on me and aim for my forehead, I'd nail you first with my trusty 9mm. I don't fool around with armed maniacs...

Aha, a vested interest! With no global warming this company is superfluous and lacks any reason to gather funding, therefore its research is inherently suspect. (It should perhaps be noted that this position leads us to dismiss most medical research.)

While it's a bit off-topic, EF&EE's connection with the research establishing that global warming is a problem and is due to human activity is minimal. Our focus is and has always been determining contributions--that is, how much of a given pollutant is being emitted from a given subset of (usually mobile) sources--and devising strategies to reduce emissions from those sources in a cost-effective manner. Our research typically consists of evaluating the effectiveness of prospective emission control technologies and determining whether a given set of emissions sources (a truck fleet, for instance) are in compliance with applicable emission laws. So, this really isn't a case of a vested interest--we have a vested interest, now that a problem has been identified, in determining where it's coming from, how much a given source is contributing, and what can be done about it.

Well, it disadvantages him. However looked at objectively, if one lacks empathy the only concern is that you may later do the same to the observer…

My point is that this hypothetical action is justified under the same reasoning he uses to dismiss global warming as a concern, and yet I doubt he would be as cavalier about the prospect of being shot as the prospect of the ice caps melting.

a company specializing in air pollution research and control policies

Aha, a vested interest! With no global warming this company is superfluous and lacks any reason to gather funding, therefore its research is inherently suspect. (It should perhaps be noted that this position leads us to dismiss most medical research.)

Suppose we were physically in the same room...

Well, it disadvantages him. However looked at objectively, if one lacks empathy the only concern is that you may later do the same to the observer...

Maybe not by itself, but it sure helps!

Financial security helps, granted, but if it doesn't buy happiness by itself, then sacrificing more important things like self-respect for financial gain is a bit like selling your car's engine to buy a bigger, more powerful stereo system.

I replied the opposite (you can go read my reply in that thread) because, unlike the universal utilitarian, I don't have morals to restrain me from getting what pleases me.

That much is apparent. It also appears that you, for whatever reason, are unable to understand that "what pleases" Adam and I extends beyond "stuff."

P.S. Global warming has actually been around for almost as long as planet earth itself: the earth will warm/cool regardless of what we as a species do (even if we were contributing to it, all we'd be doing is hastening an already existent proccess). If we as a species want to escape it, we have to find a new planet; end discussion.

I'll ignore the craven cowardice of declaring the argument over as soon as one has made one's point, giving no opportunity for rebuttal. I would be very interested to see the sources behind your opinion here. Mine is that I work for a company specializing in air pollution research and control policies and I find myself dealing with some of the data for this on a fairly frequent basis, in addition to reading on the subject and conversations with my boss, who is among the world's foremost experts on vehicle emissions. The view that we are contributing to a severe acceleration of the rate of long-term climate change is extremely well-supported; those taking the opposite position I have found to be invariably either thoroughly ignorant or in thrall to industrial and political interests opposed to responsible environmental policy for purely selfish reasons. But even assuming you're right, let's try a thought experiment:

Suppose we were physically in the same room, having this argument, and I were to pull out a pistol and put a bullet between your eyes. By your apparent reasoning here, that would be "all right", meaning that, if not necessarily moral or desirable, it's not a cause for concern or something that should be opposed. After all, you're going to die anyway, someday. By shooting you, I would just be hastening an already existing process. Yet somehow, I imagine you'd find this to be a very unappealing and undesirable prospect. I invite you to consider the implications of this.

Maybe the avid fans of your work would be disappointed and abandon you, but you still have the gulible masses (hey, if they can find O.J. innocent of murder, they will happily excuse you of "selling out" a particular worldview). In time, this "sell-out" status will disappear in the tumultuous currents of society.

O.J. is a bad example; while he was found legally innocent has been convicted quite thoroughly in the court of public opinion, which is who would be deciding whether or not one was a sell-out. But that's beside the point; *I* would be disappointed and abandon me, or the closest equivalent.

Besides, even if you don't like who you stump for at the moment, you can betray them in a moment of weakness and "sell them out" too. Then go find another movement to stump for and continue the cycle…

Leaving the immorality of this strategy aside, somehow, I think people would start to notice a pattern with the backstabbing sooner or later.

"Can financial gain buy happiness?"

Maybe not by itself, but it sure helps!

"I believe I would make the same choice Adam has, and the reasons are similar to his reasons in another post for why murdering one person for organs to save five others is wrong under universal utilitarianism (they're also similar to the reasons that I would never advocate the position that global warming is not an issue or not human-caused, no matter how much the industrial sector paid me)."

I replied the opposite (you can go read my reply in that thread) because, unlike the universal utilitarian, I don't have morals to restrain me from getting what pleases me.

P.S. Global warming has actually been around for almost as long as planet earth itself: the earth will warm/cool regardless of what we as a species do (even if we were contributing to it, all we'd be doing is hastening an already existent proccess). If we as a species want to escape it, we have to find a new planet; end discussion.

"The negative effects of sacrificing intellectual integrity for financial gain on myself (erosion of self-respect and an unfortunate precedent of disingenuity–I see this sort of compromise as equivalent to prostitution) and others (robbing the world of one more honest and upright advocate of reason and common decency) would by themselves greatly outweigh the financial gain, but the deleterious effects of being known as a "sell-out" on my long-term commercial and popular viability, and my literary and academic credibility, would more than undo even those gains in the long run."

Maybe the avid fans of your work would be disappointed and abandon you, but you still have the gulible masses (hey, if they can find O.J. innocent of murder, they will happily excuse you of "selling out" a particular worldview). In time, this "sell-out" status will disappear in the tumultuous currents of society.

Besides, even if you don't like who you stump for at the moment, you can betray them in a moment of weakness and "sell them out" too. Then go find another movement to stump for and continue the cycle...

Can financial gain buy happiness? I believe I would make the same choice Adam has, and the reasons are similar to his reasons in another post for why murdering one person for organs to save five others is wrong under universal utilitarianism (they're also similar to the reasons that I would never advocate the position that global warming is not an issue or not human-caused, no matter how much the industrial sector paid me). The negative effects of sacrificing intellectual integrity for financial gain on myself (erosion of self-respect and an unfortunate precedent of disingenuity--I see this sort of compromise as equivalent to prostitution) and others (robbing the world of one more honest and upright advocate of reason and common decency) would by themselves greatly outweigh the financial gain, but the deleterious effects of being known as a "sell-out" on my long-term commercial and popular viability, and my literary and academic credibility, would more than undo even those gains in the long run.