Climate Action Plan

I recently heard about cities in California being required to create Climate Action Plans to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and to adapt to adverse climate changes. We're all familiar with this type of thinking and can guess what is in those plans. I'd like to propose my own plan, one which is achievable and not merely aspirational, one which is driven by growth and not reduction, and one which leads to human freedom and flourishing and not governmental crackdowns.

First, we need to gratefully acknowledge that we have been given the sun as a source of practically infinite energy. According to NASA, the sun shines down 44 quadrillion watts of energy on the earth every year. This is the equivalent of 44 million large power plants in continuous operation. And even that is a miniscule fraction of the total energy emitted by the sun in every other direction than Earth. The amount of energy available to us can be regarded as infinite.

The sun has always been the source of all energy on the earth, but our method for capturing and using that energy has varied. A primitive hunter-gatherer eats plants and animals which channel energy from the sun. Burning wood or coal releases energy captured from the sun using the more advanced technology of mills and mines. Pumping and refining and burning oil was a major advance in technology that propelled modern economies, but with unforeseen consequences. Nuclear, solar, wind and geothermal energy are newer advances which have not matured yet, but have potential.

In all these cases, the energy coming from the sun can be regarded as infinite, but the limiting factor in capturing and using that energy has been human ingenuity. Any increase in human creativity and ambition is rewarded with a greater use of what we've been given. This positive, limitless perspective is fundamentally different from most climate catastrophe theories, and I sincerely believe it is correct.

Second, from this perspective, governments should see their part in fostering the growth of human creativity and productivity. We need just and peaceful societies that facilitate the education and advancement of the brightest and most ambitious among us, without regard to racial quotas or income inequality or other revolutionary social theories. Even if the schools of your city don't produce the next Einstein, your city can be a model of how to encourage learning and productivity which is then emulated elsewhere where the next Einstein lives.

Third, governments should tell the truth about what is actually happening and what is actually possible. Instead of aspirational plans without viable mechanisms, instead of virtue signaling on Earth Day, instead of recycling bins without any feedback loop on what goes in them, governments should focus on making accurate data available on the impacts of human society on the earth. Collect the data and allow human freedom and creativity to figure out what to do about it. No elected leader today knows how to solve the problem. I don't either. This should humble us. But we can agree on where the solution will come from, which is greater human ingenuity.

Fourth, governments should avoid alarmism. We often hear of water shortages in California and are urged to conserve. "We're still in a drought" is a common refrain. Yet the amount of water on earth is constant. Sometimes the reservoirs of California are full and sometimes they are empty. Climate change may cause increased droughts in some places, but it can also cause increased rain in other places. In all cases, there is an energy cost associated with pumping, damming, desalinating, and filtering. With the right technology, we can pay the cost and everyone can have water. Instead of banging the drums of calamity and reduction, which eventually are tuned out and ignored, we should focus on costs and benefits, which can lead to understanding and action.

Fourth, US and European governments should advocate solutions that can be applied worldwide because climate change is a worldwide phenomenon. One can debate whether 40 million Californians can afford EVs by 2035, but one billion Indians cannot. Any "advance" we make in our small corner of the world which can't be replicated by the billions trying to climb out of poverty amounts to virtue signaling. You aren't saving the planet; you're just driving a Tesla.

Fifth and finally, we should all calm down and be grateful. Compared to all of human history, the Industrial Revolution is a recent phenomenon. The Digital Revolution has barely gotten started. We have witnessed so much growth in prosperity and education and opportunity in our lifetime that we lose perspective on how quickly things have changed and how much we have benefited. There is certainly more to do, and some of that work may be unwinding the unintended consequences of past progress, but it can be done if we allow people the freedom to do it.

Why I'm not a Sabbatarian

In the Old Testament, God commands his people to keep the Sabbath, the seventh day of week or Saturday, by refraining from work and dedicating the time to rest and worship. Many Christians believe that the Sabbath was changed into the first day of the week or Sunday, also called the Lord's Day, and continues to have the same purpose and requirements. This Sabbatarianism is described in the Westminster Confession of Faith, chapter 21, paragraphs 7 and 8. It's a doctrine and practice over which Christians can agree to disagree, but it exposes important issues which are useful to understand. My position comes from New Covenant Theology or Progressive Covenantalism taught by reformed Baptists (that is, I didn't come up with this.)

While the Sabbath was grounded in God's pattern set in the creation week, it is only commanded to man as part of the Ten Commandments (Exodus 20:8-11), which is the opening and summary text of the Mosaic Law. The word Sabbath first appears when manna is given (Exodus 16), much like the first Passover is described a few chapters before it is instituted as part of the Law (Exodus 12). When God finishes his initial law giving in the book of Exodus, he calls the Sabbath the sign of the covenant (Exodus 31:13), just like circumcision was given as the sign and seal of the Abrahamic covenant (Genesis 17).

The Gospels show that Jesus was a faithful Jew who kept the Sabbath, but even in Jesus' teaching there are hints that something is changing (Luke 6:1-11). The rest of the New Testament explains this change by teaching that the Sabbath has been fulfilled in Christ, along with all of the Mosaic Law (Galatians 3:17-29, Colossians 2:16), In a similar way, Jesus hints that dietary and sacrificial laws would change (Mark 7:19, Mark 13:1), but he leaves it to his Apostles to explain it fully. Paul instructs Christians to graciously accept brothers who still practice the Sabbath (Romans 14:5), but he is clear in the same passage about the reality of Christian freedom from Mosaic Law (Romans 14:14).

The Christian practice of faithfully gathering on the Lord's Day is related to the Sabbath, just like baptism is related to circumcision and the Lord's Supper is related to Passover, but this relation is one of shadow giving way to substance (Hebrews 8:5, 10:1). There is continuity and discontinuity between Old and New, but we need some guide or rule to understand it.

The Westminster Confession of Faith describes a tri-partite division of Mosaic Law in chapter 19. The moral part of the Law is binding in all ages, while the ceremonial and judicial parts of the Law were temporary, only for the Old Covenant age. While this system has some value in distinguishing continuity and discontinuity, it doesn't actually help distinguish which individual laws are in each part. The Sabbath seems ceremonial, like the monthly and yearly festivals, but Westminster assumes it is part of the moral law, likely because of its placement in the Ten Commandments.

Instead, I believe the teaching of Jesus, as contained in the whole New Testament, is the Christian's guide to understanding the Old Testament. Some say that where the New Testament is silent, the Old Testament is still binding. But I find the New Testament is not silent in any matter that binds the conscience. The simple principle is that we are no longer under the jurisdiction of the Mosaic Law, which has been made obsolete, but are under the Law of Christ (Hebrews 8:13, 1 Corinthians 9:21, Galatians 5:18). In a similar way, an American citizen sees great continuity between his country's laws and British common law, but he is clearly only under the jurisdiction of the former. The Old Testament is still the infallible and authoritative Word of God, the revelation of his character and purposes, but it must be understood in submission to Christ, which means we always read it in the light of the New Testament.

The one passage in the New Testament that explicitly calls for continued observance of the Sabbath actually commands the New Covenant fulfillment of faith in Christ, not Old Covenant practice. Hebrews 3 and 4 quotes from Psalm 95, "Today if you hear my voice, do not harden your hearts as in the rebellion...As I swore in my wrath, 'They shall not enter my rest.'" The author reasons that the Psalm describes the Israelites refusing to enter Canaan under Joshua (3:16), yet it was written by David hundreds of years after that event (4:7). He then argues that there remains an ongoing command and opportunity to believe God and enter his rest (4:8). And then he says, "So then, there remains a Sabbath rest for the people of God, for whoever has entered God's rest has also rested from his works as God did from his. Let us therefore strive to enter that rest." This Sabbath rest has the same precedent in God's creation week, it's related to the Mosaic Sabbath rest, but it is a rest from keeping the Mosaic Law by instead trusting in Christ who is the better mediator, better high priest, better sacrifice and better temple. If this one reference to the Sabbath establishes a continuation of Old Covenant practice, it makes no sense of the immediate context or the argument of the entire book.

Finally, how does this affect my practice? I have no trouble being in close fellowship with Christians who practice a Sabbath day. I would never want to flaunt my freedom. I highly value the gathering of the church on the Lord's Day and the wisdom of taking a break from work and using the time to worship God and studying his Word. I'm even writing this blog post on a quiet, easy Sunday afternoon. But I don't call it Sabbath keeping. Christ is my Sabbath and I have entered into his rest by faith.

Covid and Climate Change

To speak with authority on the COVID-19 pandemic or on climate change, you generally need some academic credentials or professional experience. These are complex scientific topics. Yet it seems that both covid and climate change have a lot in common, and the list of experts who are well-qualified to speak on both must be very small. Our scientific age of hyper-specialization has created a conundrum for the common man to untangle.

Both covid and climate change involve risk analysis. How dangerous is it? How does the danger of a new coronavirus variant compare to other dangers like social isolation, putting people out of work, or shutting down schools? It took time for data to come in and these varying risk levels to become more actionable. Likewise, how does the danger of warming two degrees Centigrade compare to the danger of third world poverty? What kind of timeframe is needed to make this judgment? When anyone argues that there's no more time to debate, my skepticism grows.

Even with some agreement on the danger, both covid and climate change involve a cost/benefit analysis for mitigation. What can actually be done about it, at what cost, and who gets to decide? After three years of mask mandates (finally ending February 2023), it became clear that there was no point in discussing the effectiveness of the mask. It had reduced to a sign of compliance. Some may think the mask is an effective and effortless way to reduce risk. Others see the mask as useless and authoritarian. Whatever your opinion, the sign is primary and the effectiveness is secondary. This reminds me of the recycling bin and a curious incident at my company years ago. At an all-hands townhall meeting, the CEO would often answer questions from the employees. One employee was concerned that our cleaning staff regularly tossed the contents of the recycle bins and the trash bins into the same dumpster. The CEO responded that we shouldn't worry because the recycling gets separated out at the waste facility. I've never looked at the sign and significance of the recycling bin quite the same again.

Both covid and climate change involve a tension between public policy and personal responsibility, which maps neatly to our left/right party lines. Governors of New York and California issued strong mandates to control public behavior. Governors of Florida and South Dakota issued strong statements that individual citizens should remain free to confront the problem as they thought best. The virus knows nothing of state lines, so we have no clear-cut way of measuring who was right. Carbon emissions also know nothing of state lines, so the effectiveness of climate legislation in California can't really be measured.

Both covid and climate change pit the developed West against developing Asia. The virus originated from China, possibly from Western-funded lab research gone wrong, and it spread rapidly out of Asia with Western-driven globalization. The Asian-style response of lock downs and masks also spread with it to the West. If the burning of fossil fuels has been the decisive factor in rising temperatures, that innovation arose in the West as well. And yet it's Asia that is now burning the greatest amount of fossil fuels to lift multiple billions of people out of poverty for the first time. Asia is going to burn what it needs to burn in order to get there, and who in the West can say no?

Finally, both covid and climate change show the dangers and benefits of modern science. We may have created that virus, and we may have created this global warming. But we also quickly created a vaccine and new medications, and we have smart people who can figure out how to produce and consume energy in new ways without the old risks. I don't have much faith in government mandates, but I do in human ingenuity.