Oil supply limits: I've talked with a few petroleum engineers about this, and the consensus among my informal sample is that we won't run out for at least 100 years. With that said, every "oil" company of any significant size is diversifying by developing alternative forms of energy. After all, once the market really starts transitioning from petroleum to something else, no one wants to be caught with all their eggs in one basket.



Pollution/Climate Change: I agree that we still need organizations like the EPA to control pollution, or else we will damage the planet. That goes without saying. However, a radical change of policy would be ill-advised if based only on obviously flawed science. At this point we basically have to completely backtrack and restart all analyses from the beginning if we want to determine, with any degree of reliability, how our actions are affecting the condition of our planet. In the meantime, we should retain our current policies to limit pollution for the sake of both the environment and public health.



Rhetoric: The whole reason I strongly oppose many environmentalist movements is because I've suspected that the science has been faulty for quite some time. Over the past decade, many researchers have disagreed with the theories of global warming and climate change, but this has seen little attention in the mass media. Instead they have spouted arguments about the "incontrovertible" scientific evidence, which, as we all know, goes completely against the very nature of scientific inquiry. Further, all the talk about "reduce your carbon footprint," etc., etc. sounded like a massive guilt trip built upon this metaphorical house of cards.

In short, I'm more inclined to stop eating beef so that cows can produce that much more CO2 into the atmosphere than to make any effort to reduce my carbon footprint.