One must admire consacre professionals like Zack, who have left their confort zone, in a courageous attempt to find answers to pressing needs. As an economist, I know that no matter how careful one is, when facing complex models and calamity algorithms, like everything eventually resting on probabilities, you are opening yourself to errors.



And new fields, where the parameters shaping event probabilities are more "fuzzy logic" than deterministic formulae, errors will happen. Ergo, when Zack left the cozy domain of his well trodden turf to embark literally into the unknown, that deserves admiration.





There may not be scientific evidence linking green house gas emissions and hurricane intensity. Yet, hurricanes seem to be in a trend to gain more intensity and their paths to move further North than has been historically the case. True, the Houston pain came from warmer bottom waters, but that does not necessarily mean green house gasses had anything to do with it.



Unfortunately, the concern with climate change, valid as it might or might not be, has taken our attention away from more pressing and immediate challenges. In Houston, for example, the paving over of the natural drain surfaces, and across the Eastern Seaboard, the systematic destruction of wet lands, continues to be ignored (with glorious exceptions like widespread improvements in the health of the majestic Chesapeake Bay)



In Florida, its residents, carpetbaggers or otherwise , led by an enlightened Tallahassee, have chosen to look the other way as that planetary marvel , the Everglades, as developers also pave it over. State and local politicos have convinced them that, as they run out of water, the Federal Government will bring the precious liquid from far away At the macro level, garbage in general and plastics in particular continue to poison lands and oceans. Some countries, like the UK and the EU are prohibiting the use of plastic straws...in our homeland, zero, zilch, nada.



What economist call external costs, let others pay for our parasitic excess. Even our millennials continue to use and throw away one time use bottle waters and other plastic containers and utensils. We, oldies but goodies may move on soon, but they will be stuck with their irresponsibility for many decades. Should I be concern about the future of my grandchildren? No one seem to care other than their parents.



China's refusal to take on the filth from the "industrialized" world should elicit some type of response. But our governments, by and large, are too busy redirecting the public trough to their masters and to their own bank accounts.



Yes, we have bigger fish to fry than climate change...but that does not mean the most powerful nation in the history of humankind should ignore it.