three thoughts leap to the forefront of my brain.  One is

"Boy oh boy, some people will do ANYTHING rather than ride a bicycle."

and the next is

The Grand Plan for the Transformation of Nature

and the last is

Parachuting Cats into Borneo

grandiosity and a bad paradigm is what got us into this mess -- more of the same ain't gonna get us out.

oh, and one other thought:  we're already seeing declining agricultural and forest productivity and we want to allow less sunlight to reach our forests and plantations?  while continuing to destroy the ocean food chain?  seems like this is one more technofix that makes sure we can keep driving SUVs and lighting up Las Vegas -- while destroying our food and water supply.  there's a prioritisation problem here.

I would say the destruction of civilisation is already well under way (Afghanistan, Iraq, Darfur...) -- and I would say that the flooded-out Bangladeshi peasantry know very well that the SUV-driving, air-conditioned US bourgeoisie are the proximate cause of not only their poverty but their climate disasters, and that the poor of this earth will understand quite well that "Sunlight Defence Shield Engineering" is just another ploy of the Rich to keep gobbling (and create obscene no-bid contracts for the corporadoes) while the Rest starve.

and when the unintended consequences (and there will be some, there always are) kick in?  then what?

in retrospect the entire reductionist technomanagerial approach has failed repeatedly, lurching from vandalism to bandaid to flailing correction to failure again. it's time to junk the whole model of "engineering the planet," imho, and learn some biomimicry skills.  instead of treating biota like machinery, learn to make machinery that works like biota, or to work with biota instead of machinery.

"anything that can't go on, probably won't."

one of the most depressing articles yet to appear at ET, congrats technoP -- and I thought I was depressing...

The difference between theory and practise in practise ...