Credit Crunch Humour

A man from a rather specific down to earth part of the UK said the following lines to me over the Christmas period,

'If these goddamn experts can't predict a credit crunch six months before it happens how the hell can they tell what the weather is going to be doing in fifty years time, global warming I don't believe it.'

Like many things in life most experts over complicate arguments to make themselves feel self important and intelligent, most arguments around the social sciences and sometimes even in science can be had on a way more basic level and the man on the street can be as likely to get it right as an esteemed Nobel prize winner.

The credit crunch at a simple level was should we be borrowing so much to spend on rubbish? How long can that go on? A very simple argument really.

Yet scientists will operate very hypocritically in that once they want to convince the public of something they will try and scare them by cutting out any sense of doubt in their estimation models. So without doubt it makes sense to try and conserve what resources we have, not be so wasteful, look at renewable forms of energy, but is global warming really going to happen, is the case really so clear, or are we simply focusing on the one factor which is less political and easier to explain.

Surely the more complex argument is we need to be eating different foods, we need to looking at how we can encourage smaller families as population growth combined with wealth growth is the true problem.

So will our form of capitalism based on ever increased wealth, which fuels the bribe that is democracy, I will make you richer and your kids so vote for me survive? I don't know if global warming will happen, but resource depletion will, competition over scarce resources will, a challenge to modern democracy will and the limits to growth will perhaps be reached.

This is my view though and not based on any empirical testing and i don't pretend to be a scientist who can prove it 100%, I leave that to others who cut out the doubt around prediction and there is always doubt, but we the public are too stupid to hear their doubts.