Energy Policy and Our Obligations to Others

Californians vote tomorrow on a number of measures and candidates for various state and local offices. I’ve tried to pay some level of attention to all the issues (not only those pertaining to energy) and stand ready to make each of the major choices.

I just noticed that one of the issues concerns mandatory vaccinations. I’ve always been intrigued by this issue, which I summarize as follows:

We all have a certain small probability of a bad reaction to a vaccination for a certain disease, but if society forces everyone to face that risk, the population as a whole will be healthier. However, if a large percentage of other people get the vaccination and you don’t, you personally have a greater probability of health than the population at large.

Here we are, back again at the crux of so many interesting philosophic issues. Are we personally, or at the level of our families, willing to make personal sacrifices for the public good — or at least subject ourselves to the same hardships that we ask our fellows to face? If not, what will we do to avoid them? Protest? Cheat?

There are so many parallels in everyday life — and we’ve been facing them since we were kindergartners. When offered a plate of cookies, do we take as many as we want? Or do we survey the room to see roughly how many guests there are, and determine how much our appetite for cookies should be repressed in order to make sure that everyone has an equal opportunity to share in a bounty that is clearly meant to be shared equally?

This subject has arisen a great deal recently in our discourse on energy policy. In particular, are we willing to pay a bit extra for clean energy? Is it reasonable to demand that we all pay an extra couple of cents per kilowatt-hour for electricity that doesn’t come from coal — a source that is most clearly ruining our quality of life here on Earth?  The answer to those questions actually boils down to this: How much do we really care about other people – living today on this planet, and those as yet to be born?

When I think about this subject, I’m reminded of a man from whom I learned a great deal last year, Dr. Jason Scorce, Associate Professor and Chair of the International Environmental Policy Program at The Monterey Institute of International Studies. He really laid the subject out nicely for me when I interviewed him as we sat outside a grocery story in Oakland in preparation for my most recent book: Is Renewable Really Doable?

Here is a link to some of Jason’s other contributions to the subject.

Please feel free to comment.  We just had out 5,000th comment here, btw, of which only a few hundred were mine.  Thanks again to all who have contributed so greatly.