"The critical political issue of the 21st century is recognizing that the crisis is now, not in the future, and doing something about it in time to retain the possibility of food security for the existing population. Nothing else really matters at all, because if we don't get that right people will go extinct more probably than not." The human race goes extinct because the global temperature increases by a few degrees Celsius?

"They don't want to give up the Industrial Civilization they struggled so mightily to build." And you think they'll have to? Here is a post I made relative to an letter by the editors of Technology Review. I'd be interested in your predictions for the year 2050 and 2100 for the parameters in the table I drew up: http://markbahner.typepad.com/random_thoughts/2013/03/my-entry.html

"So this would be of tremendous value to me, but it need not involve much additional energy (at least compared to the first ~80 years of life)." "Living *forever* would in fact need infinite additional energy." OK, how about living 10,000 years?

"You seem to be assuming a growth rate of per capita income of more than 7% a year. Which is way higher than historical averages..." Yes, I predict per-capita economic growth will accelerate from 2-3 percent per year to >10 percent per year by 2060: http://markbahner.typepad.com/random_thoughts/2004/10/3rd_thoughts_on.html ...due to advances in computers: http://markbahner.typepad.com/random_thoughts/2005/11/why_economic_gr.html

Hi Tom, I agree with Randall O'Toole's point that the Forest Service shouldn't be trying to manipulate the fuels in all the forests in the U.S. Where I think we might disagree is that I wouldn't mind if the federal government developed a rapid response system that can protect houses from wildfires. For example, fire retardant gels seems to work to significantly reduce the chances that a home burns down. I wouldn't mind if the federal government bought several million dollars worth of fire retardant gel, and used helicopters to get it from storage sites in various states to the location of fires that threaten houses.