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Synopsis: This article provides a reply to Harvard law professor Jody Freeman's contribution to this journal, "A Critical Look at The Moral Case for Fossil Fuels," a critique of my 2014 book, The Moral Case for Fossil Fuels (MCFF). MCFF argues that the way we have been taught to think about and discuss energy issues is wrong, and that if we follow a better method of thinking, we will conclude that the proper energy policy for the foreseeable future requires increasing our use of fossil fuels-not dramatically and coercively restricting our fossil fuel use. Unfortunately, instead of engaging the book's method and attempting to refute its evaluations, Freeman's article ignores the book's method and significantly misrepresents its major arguments. This response gives a proof that Freeman's portrayal of MCFF's method and content is a straw man, and summarizes the actual arguments of the book. It does so primarily through repeated, side-by-side comparisons of unaltered passages by Freeman purporting to describe MCFF's viewpoint and unaltered passages from MCFF clearly stating its actual viewpoint. In doing this, this article elucidates some of the book's actual points that readers might benefit from and perhaps be convinced to explore in more detail-and encourages us to increase the level of intellectual precision in our debate so that we can have a constructive conversation about today's vital energy and environmental issues.
I.INTRODUCTION
In 2007, as a philosopher analyzing popular thinking on numerous cultural, industrial, and political issues, I concluded that popular thinking and discussion about energy and its associated environmental issues was severely flawed. For example, logic dictates that when analyzing any course of action we carefully consider both the positives and negatives of all our alternatives. Yet in popular discussion only the negatives of fossil fuels were considered, while the negatives of "green" sources of energy were all but ignored.
For example, there was a widespread focus on the dangers of coal mining but almost none on the far greater dangers of rare-earth mining required to produce vital components of wind turbines. There was a widespread focus on the alleged wonders of solar and wind but almost none on the unique positives of hydrocarbon (fossil) fuels, such as the unique energy density of liquid hydrocarbon (oil) fuels.
Just as...