THESE FORUMS NOW CLOSED (read only)
Fun Stuff => CHATTER => Topic started by: jhocking on 10 Aug 2008, 07:25
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Just saw this on another forum, posted by a fellow who is clearly not a fan of Al Gore:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HKVkgY45eLU
I was struck by the part about there being 30,000 scientists, and supporting the scientists are 9,000 PHD researchers. Wait, so if only a fraction of the "scientists" have doctorates, what exactly is their definition of a scientist? I mean, is every tom-dick-and-harry with a vested interest in the global warming debate considered a scientist?
Given that bit of hand waving, I'm rather leery of the "9000 PHd researchers" bit too. I mean, I'm sure they really do have 9000 people with PHds lined up, but PHds in what?
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Somehow we have to be heard, so we figured maybe a court of law...
So, they want to sue someone because they are beeing ignored? Gee, i wonder why the rest of the world tends to think of the US in a certain way...
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We've been burning fossil fuels for a hundred years and nothing has happened! I breathe CO2 out of my mouth and nothing happens! CO2 is a natural compound and furthermore HURF DURF HURF DURF
Man I don't get people who can't understand what climate change means.
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A scientist is someone who professionally does science. You dont need a degree to practice science, hell if I started making soap myself to sell, I could label myself a scientist. So frankly I dont think its fair to try to burn the Weather Channel for their use of Scientist. The stupid part is these people deny Global Warming. I mean, shit even if global warming doesn't exist, and just the natural ebb and flow of the worlds climate. I mean, how many mass extinctions and stuff comes from Ice Ages and Sunny-Beach Ages.
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I love how he says "We've been trying to get a debate going."
There's already been a debate. You've been proven wrong, and consequently lost.
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frankly I dont think its fair to try to burn the Weather Channel for their use of Scientist.
I wasn't so much trying to burn them as pointing out how their claim isn't as impressive as one might first think. As they use the term, saying "30,000 scientists" is really no different from just saying "30,000 people."
Put that way, it's hardly surprising that they have a petition with 30,000 signatures on it.
ADDITION: hm that maybe still doesn't make my point clear. I'm not saying that their use of the term "scientist" is incorrect, just that it's misleading.
As you point out, a soap-maker could accurately call themself a scientist, but that's not particularly relevant to the global warming thing, now is it? By bringing it up in that context, the guy is implying that these scientists are all specialists in climate change research, but that's not actually what his use of the term means.
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Well I'm all for grilling Gore, but mostly because he's a douche
I love how he says "We've been trying to get a debate going."
There's already been a debate. You've been proven wrong, and consequently lost.
The fact is that nobody's been proven wrong, really, and only time will tell who was right. I don't think the existence of global warming is the real issue though, I think that what we do in regards to the environment is equally important with or without it.
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What I think is ridiculous, is how willing people are willing to listen to the topics brought up in An Inconvenient Truth, without doing any thinking or research on their own. Most likely this does not apply to this forum, but how many of the average part time environmental activists do you think have seen any research from other sources? The average high schooler who spends their time touting about global warming has seen nothing but an Inconvenient Truth to back them up, and yet they will defend global warming without a second thought.
I'm not saying one way or the other on the issue, and I'm not saying there's not a lot more evidence out there supporting An Inconvenient Truth, I'm just saying that it is dangerous thinking, or lack there of, to just accept these claims outright without a thought. Yet, if someone is to say otherwise, they are instantly berated by these very people.
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Well what *I* am saying is that, clearly the environment is changing, and life exists in a very delicate balance. Whether or not its cause by CO2 emissions is not exactly relevent, wouldnt you rather be proven wrong by being more eco conscious and not affecting change, than proven right by not giving a shit about man-made environmental changes (bottom line is if CO2 isnt causing global warming, well its still not something that would occur naturally in such high doses, and if the world has been chugging along with life for hundreds of million years, maybe if it aint broke dont fix it)?
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The biggest problem with that philosophy, is that if it isn't the CO2 that is causing the rise in climates, that we don't know what is helping it, and what can be done to stop it. If the problem is truly something that we don't know at this point, then the cause could very well be something that we are doing in an attempt to be more ecologically friendly. We never know, we could always be doing more harm than help. I'm not saying we shouldn't do something, I just don't want people to give up because they have decided they found the cause, and not do any more research. And I also don't want someone who could be doing very positive research to be laughed away because he disagrees with An Inconvenient Truth. Remember that during the early 20th century, cigarettes were recommended by doctors to reduce stress, at the time, they didn't know any better.
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RE not getting what climate change means:
If people could be communists into the 70's, through the thuggish Russian Revolution, horrific civil war, red terror, terror famines, great terror, Nazi-Soviet Pact, iron curtain, Hungarian revolution and Prague Spring, because they continued to -believe- in the dream of a worker's paradise and thus think that everything that discredited it was simply a capitalist lie, then it makes perfect sense that those whose ideologies are inconvenienced by certain scientific consenses will deny them. Ideology is a powerful force in shaping how people see reality, these days probably more so than religion in much of the world.
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I read an issue of New Scientist that I thought made a really good point. Global Warming is a human problem, other species will continue to adapt and move on as they have since life was first formed, and ultimately only humans will be impacted.
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I think the article meant as a species they would adapt (into another species) which would mean that humans as humans would suffer more. Plus, humans aren't like other animals in that we are very dependent on stable, consistent environments and would mostly be wiped out almost completely with very little effort.
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evolution works the same way for humans as it does for every other species, which is by killing absolutely everything expect the few that are able to survive and procreate.
over 99.9% of creatures that have lives on earth are now extinct. the few that aren't probably will be very very soon. it's essentially a random trial and error process with an extremely huge fail rate. adapting to a new environment isn't the same thing as evolving, which are random genetic mutations that take millions of years to become common. every other animal on earth is pretty much going to go through the same thing we are.
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well yes, adaptation is evolution, it is just a single rung along a very, very long ladder.
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ah, right, adaptation is the right word. i was thinking of something else.
still, it goes against the point that animals would suffer less than humans since species only really evolve in the first place when something kills the old species before they can procreate but not the new one. otherwise you get animals like tortoises and sharks which have stayed the same for literally billions of years because there is no reason why any offspring they have, even if genetically different, would have any advantage over them. so in order for organisms to evolve in the first place, it's implied that something must be happening that's killing a whole bunch of the original species but not the genetic anomalies. which could be climate change, and the same thing would probably end up happening to humans as well.
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every other animal on earth is pretty much going to go through the same thing we are.
Which is precisely why global warming is an issue of such magnitude.
Earth certainly does go through periods of warming and cooling, as evidenced by the numerous ice ages. But the rate at which the temperature is increasing in unprecedented. It's amazing what scientists have been able to learn by drilling deep down into Arctic and Antarctic ice and tell what the general average temperature of an era was (I don't recall the minutiae of the process for how they determine that, but it's a fairly common and accepted practice.) The average temperature heights reached after an ice age were surpassed long ago. We're really in uncharted territory here.
And the fact that we've sat around on our hands for so long doing nothing while clowns like this bleat on like deranged cattle has possibly moved us beyond a point where we can even do anything to halt, let alone reverse, the warming trend. And as water levels rise and inundates massively populated areas along coasts, a flood of people will cause a huge strain on every region of the world. We're looking at hundreds of millions of displaced, poor, malnourished, sick people.
I'm not being alarmist or hyperbolic. It's already happening in low-lying countries like Bangladesh, Seychelles, the Maldives, dozens of Pacific island nations. Some of these places are going to be completely submerged in a decade's time...
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I read an issue of New Scientist that I thought made a really good point. Global Warming is a human problem, other species will continue to adapt and move on as they have since life was first formed, and ultimately only humans will be impacted.
How is this a good point? "Oh don't worry, we're not going to wipe out all life, just life as we know it."
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From a human perspective, it is very bad. Your grand children probably will not survive if global warming is in fact true.
Yet, from a world perspective, it is old hat. We are not destroying the Earth, we are changing the Earth, which is a natural process, as we are part of the world. Everything we do, everything we make is natural. No matter how much humans like to believe we are special and different, we are not. Humans ceasing to exist is not the end of the world. The animals we know ceasing to exist is not the end of the world. In fact, it is completely normal. Trying to stop it truly is futile, at most we can prolong our death as a species. But no matter what, the world will go on.
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well sure it is!
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It can be reassuring to know you are a part of something much bigger than yourself, or anything humans could do.
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I found out recently that Al Gore was once friends with Fred Phelps. I don't like Al Gore much anymore.
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I read an issue of New Scientist that I thought made a really good point. Global Warming is a human problem, other species will continue to adapt and move on as they have since life was first formed, and ultimately only humans will be impacted.
Ummm not really, the natural ebb and flow of global temperatures which happened much slower than this current warming caused massive ecological changes to occur.
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Guys.
Guys guys guys.
Can't we all at least agree that we're just dudes (or ladies) on an internet forum arguing about something instead of trying to change it in one or another?
Can't we all just admit that we're only doing this as a thought exercise because we will never change anyone's mind, especially our own?
Isn't that really the inconvenient truth?
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Well it's either this or "GENTLEMENS CLUB/TEA PARTY AHBLOO-BLOO-BLOO" threads. At least these are actually interesting.
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Why can't we just go back to trying to fuck each other?
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Didn't that get the forum shut down before?
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Why can't we just go back to trying to fuck each other?
You say this as if you ever stopped trying.
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And I will never stop loving you, Bryan.
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I tell you, fucking will cause the world to heat up even faster and so we will be doubly doomed.
So it's safe to say Al Gore would not approve of fucking.
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But when his only ethical option is Tipper, can you blame him?
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You say this as if you ever stopped trying.
I'll see you Chicago, sexy.
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Everyone in this place is just getting so damn horny.
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But when his only ethical option is Tipper, can you blame him?
oh snap!
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I'll see you Chicago, sexy.
Ozy, are you really going to be there?
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Somebody come to Chicago so I can say I met a real life internet person.
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POPULATE OR PERISH, FOLKS
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Goddammit, I am going to try my damnedest. My absolute damnedest. I didn't end up going to Tronno was just because it was hell of expensive and I was too lazy to get a passport. Chicago is cheaper and arguably inside the United States, so it is very likely. I hope. Dammit.
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Chicago is arguably within the US?
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Under some interpretations of the constitution.
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Man. Chicagocon is going to be the party of the century. Ozy and Bryan? So many boys, so little time!
(Is she kidding, folks? Is she?)
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There's going to be a Chicagocon? Please somebody give me a link and some background information.
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ChicagoCon slogan:
"Chicago is in the United States, and Ozy is going to be in Everybody"
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Yusssssssssss...
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Man fuck Chicagocon. I'm going to be in Bostronnocon or whatever the hell we are calling it now. I'm a foriegner! That's way more interesting than your run of the mill, domestic forumites!
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We'll have Canadians, and Tommy.
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I fail to see the relevance.
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Liz, everyone has had Tommy.
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You haven't. I bet you're just jealous.
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Also, Bostron is a figment of your imagination :x
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I found this picture on this internet for earlier in this thread, but I'm going to use it anyway because I took the 5 seconds to GIS.
(http://www.pretentiousgamer.com/photos/anitipper.gif)
There you go.
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The number of people on the internet who want to have sex with me has gone up dramatically in recent months.
I'm really not sure what to make of this.
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I dunno it seems pretty straightforward to me how you should feel
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The number of people on the internet who want to have sex with me has gone up dramatically in recent months.
I'm really not sure what to make of this.
I don't see why this is anything to be concerned about.
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The number of people on the internet who want to have sex with me has gone up dramatically in recent months.
I wanted to have sex with you before it was cool.
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The number of people on the internet who want to have sex with me has gone up dramatically in recent months.
I'm really not sure what to make of this.
I dunno it seems pretty straightforward to me how you should feel
Easy there, Dolores.
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That host is basically the posterchild for what Fox News is. Some dude who is annoying and buttboyish, trying to make daily events and opinions seem rad and edgy. Jesus Christ. It's a news channel and one of the first lines he says is "He founded The Weather Channel, my favorite channel. Lotta hot chicks there."
what
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I love how he says "We've been trying to get a debate going."
There's already been a debate. You've been proven wrong, and consequently lost.
How has anyone been proven wrong???
Don't get me started on this "global warming" crap. Anyone who now questions this idea of global warming and your carbon footprint are deneyed as modern day heretics. The fact that this global warming argument is an easy ticket for governments and companies to drastically throw up prices, increase legislation, and essentially piss all over the average man and woman are simply ignored in what has become a super fashionable movement.
Yes of course there is climate change, there always has been. Hell, they used to be able to ice skate across the Thames in London during the Tudor period it was so cold. Before that the the Romans would grow vines of grapes in Northern England in order to make wine. The world has always warmed up and cooled down in natural cycles. It's simply the sheer arrogance of man to believe that they can combat it in anyway and we can stop the earth itself simply doing its thing.....
What about the fact that the temperature on Mars has been rising over the past few years? Is that my fault now because I don't cycle to work and back???
The fact is that we have been sold a lie. A lie which conveniently means that governments and big business can make even more money out of us, and what's more they can try and make us feel guilty about the very process.
By all means be green. Reduce, reuse, recycle and all that jazz. It makes good sense of course it does. Don't buy into the convenient lie however that you and I are to blame for what is a perfectly natural cycle the world goes through and then be made to pay for the privilege.
(http://photos-g.ak.facebook.com/photos-ak-sf2p/v252/78/4/517477371/n517477371_486070_8092.jpg)
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Goddammit I thought I killed the discussion.
Fine.
This is what the current environmental debate is:
There's two guys sitting in a room. There's a pile of food in one corner and a toiler in the other. These two dudes are stuffing their face with the food and constantly defecating. They're just letting the feces fall whereever into steaming piles. Eventually, the room gets hotter, proportional to the amount of feces in it. One dude says "Hey, the room is hotter, is that because of the feces? Maybe we should clean it up or something or stop eating so much." the other dude says "The room is the same temperature." Eventually, the room keeps getting hotter and the first dude says "No, it's hotter and it's definitely because of the feces." The second guy goes "Yeah, okay, I guess you were right, but it's not because of the feces. You can't just say it's the feces that makes it hotter, there's way more variables than that here." The first guy says,"Fuck you, look it's the feces. It makes more sense than anything else." The second due is like "Really? Because the walls are hotter than usual too, which can't be because of the feces." Meanwhile, they just keep defecating all over the place and cramming food in their mouths. Eventually the first dude says "Okay, wait, hold on. All we have to do is split the room into your side and my side. If you have too much feces on your side of the room, then you pay me some money and it'll be okay." The second dude is like "Wait, what? What if your side has too much? And I don't accept that the feces are a problem anyway!" Of course, by now the room is stinky, hot, and they're knee-deep in feces. Eventually they die of cholera.
The moral being that it doesn't matter how hot it is, clean up your shit and don't argue about it. It's fucking common sense.
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That's assuming it's something you can clean up.
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It is something you can clean up.
I'm not even going to get into the specifics of the science, let alone the way the body of science works.
What gets me is that people who say "Oooh global warming is a trendy conspiracy, there's still lots of debate, the science isn't certain" generally use it as an excuse for doing nothing.
Thing is, it makes perfect economic and environmental sense to act as if global warming is man made, even if it isn't.
The reason being making cars more fuel efficient, switching to renewable energy sources, making industrial processes more energy efficient, hell, even making residential homes more energy efficient- all of these things save you money in the long term and reduce pollutants that negatively impoact human health.
Eating less meat might help avert human induced climate change, but guess what- it's also healthier for you! It also reduces erosion to arid farmland caused by overgrazing and hard-hoofed animals!
Running cars of something other than oil might might help avert human induced climate change, but guess what- it also allows you to stop invading other countries to ensure supplies of foreign oil keep flowing!
I personally think global warming is one of the most important symptom of a lot of problems with our society. But even if you ignore global warming, these problems still have plenty of other harmful symptoms which can be addressed using exactly the same actions.
If people can't act on the possibility that they might completely fuck up the earth because they don't believe the majority of scientists involved in the field, then at the very least you'd think they can act out of selfish reasons, like their own wallet and health.
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(http://photos-g.ak.facebook.com/photos-ak-sf2p/v252/78/4/517477371/n517477371_486070_8092.jpg)
oh awesome cox & forkum
hey what do you guys think about the middle east
(http://www.coxandforkum.com/archives/07.01.02.SomalFront-X.gif)
oh cool
how about talks with palestinian leaders
(http://www.coxandforkum.com/archives/07.04.03.Syriana-X.gif)
hm fascinating
john kerry, do you have an opinion on him
(http://www.coxandforkum.com/archives/DiscardedMedals-X.gif)
neat
i think we've heard eno
(http://www.coxandforkum.com/archives/Mosquerade-X.gif)
okay guys we'v
(http://www.coxandforkum.com/archives/04.09.21.Goat-X.gif)
listen i need to keep posti
(http://www.coxandforkum.com/archives/04.09.08.ConTerrorIII-X.gif)
oh god they'll kill me someone get hel
(http://www.coxandforkum.com/archives/05.02.27.OhCanada-X.gif)
(http://www.coxandforkum.com/archives/07.02.20.ThrowDown-X.gif)
(http://www.coxandforkum.com/archives/06.01.31.ImageProblem-X.gif)
(http://www.coxandforkum.com/archives/07.02.01.UnMemoriam-X.gif) (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vietnam_Veterans_Memorial)
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Am I going to be ostracized because I found those mildly amusing?
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Lol, I didn't say I agreed with them, I just laughed at them.
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I rarely find bigotry amusing. But y'know, different strokes.
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Ok, in a very simplistic view on our future, depending on global warming existing or not there are four options
1: Global warming was all just a big hoax and we do nothing about it.
Result: We go on living just as we have, though eventually we run out of fossil fuels.
2: Global warming was all just a big hoax, but we act as if it wasn't.
Result: Our quality of living deteriorates for a while, but we are now attached to a renewable energy sauce.
3: Global warming exists and we act to counter it
Result: similar to 2
4: Global warming exists and we do nothing about it
Result: Life as we know it is wiped out.
Now I know 1 is the ideal option there. But personally I would much prefer to do something about it and end up with option 2 or 3, than end up with 4 because we were too busy praying it would be 1.
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Precautionary principle, basically.
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Now I know 1 is the ideal option there. But personally I would much prefer to do something about it and end up with option 2 or 3, than end up with 4 because we were too busy praying it would be 1.
Why is 1 the ideal option?
I'd have thought 2 would be better, given the inevitable depletion of resources and consequent price rises, which we're already seeing.
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Am I going to be ostracized because I found those mildly amusing?
Seriously?
Which one did you find amusing? Was it the one where Kerry is swiftboated? The one where a furious Uncle Sam punches a mosque into dust? I put a link on the last one to give it some context because there was a similar situation! Was that the funny one?
I genuinely don't find any of those funny in the least. A few of them are actually jokeless.
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Well the one where they completely ignored everything good about Islam struck me as amusing, having been on the receiving end of that as a(erstwhile) Christian, and the one about the Weather Channel was kinda funny, mostly because my mom raises chickens, and if you anthropomorphised them this is exactly how they would act.
And yeah, the "holy place" one was funny because it reminds me of playing tag when I was a kid. One of the kids who was "it" got really pissed off at all the teasing and beat seven kinds of hell out of the slowest kid.
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Please tell me how, as an American (or English, Australian, South American, Mexican, etc.) Christian, you understand the popular persecution faced by Muslims in this climate of fear?
Also, why is random violence amidst a children's game funny at all, and how does it relate to the idea of indiscriminately destroying places of worship?
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No, I don't understand it. I just said that I had been on the same end of the verbal abuse factor.
As for violence in children's games being funny... when you were a kid didn't you think it was hilarious? I sure as hell did. That is why I still like South Park. And the whole "I'm in a holy place" is like "Haha I reached base! you suck, hahaha."
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I don't quite think you're getting the point of these political cartoons. Just a hunch, but the whole "I reached base!" thing was not what is intended.
Also, what are you talking about with the verbal abuse factor?
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Yeah, what the hell is up with the mosque-punching one? It's not even attempting to make any kind of comment. And the Somalia one--boy, that worked out well. Now it's just back to anarchy instead of a mildly Islamist government that actually provided some stability.
How has anyone been proven wrong???
It's obvious that you've discounted all proof that has come out that goes against what you believe, whereas there has been absolutely no "proof," no scientific evidence, coming from those who claim that it's a hoax. The very act is futile because it's a scientific law that you can't prove a negative. The burden of proof is on those who are trying to prove a positive--that something does exist. And it's been proven that the earth is warming, and that it's "90 percent" certain, according to the IPCC, the world-wide panel of scientists who are the most well-renowned, well-respected, learned and proven in their fields. I'm fairly certain you may say "But it's called the International Panel on Climate Change! It's so obviously biased!" The Panel was set up and comprised of mostly scientists who had no vested interest or formal opinion on the matter to conduct intensive analysis of continual streams of data and experiments.
Not everything is a conspiracy, friend.
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Oh jeez, with this holier than thou attitude the forum takes Im amazed we havent solved global warming ourselves.
Leave the dude alone.
*edit*
Im refering to Leinad getting ostracised.
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Correcting a person and telling the facts is completely legitimate, especially when he started off in a somewhat belligerent manner.
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I just wanted to know which cartoons he found amusing because I couldn't pick the funny one in there out of a lineup. He gave reasons, I'm satisfied.
Leonidas is talking out of his ass, though. Sorry, Leonidas. You are talking out of your ass.
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The burden of proof is on those who are trying to prove a positive--that something does exist. And it's been proven that the earth is warming, and that it's "90 percent" certain, according to the IPCC, the world-wide panel of scientists who are the most well-renowned, well-respected, learned and proven in their fields. I'm fairly certain you may say "But it's called the International Panel on Climate Change! It's so obviously biased!" The Panel was set up and comprised of mostly scientists who had no vested interest or formal opinion on the matter to conduct intensive analysis of continual streams of data and experiments.
But yet it would seem the temperature of the Earth globally has actually dropped over the past 12 months.
http://www.dailytech.com/Temperature+Monitors+Report+Widescale+Global+Cooling/article10866.htm
But yet you say that it's simply a proven fact and it's "90 percent" certain. Putting it in quotation marks doesn't make it true however. Neither does the link I posted. That's the whole point, the debate isn't anywhere near finished.
And as for the scientists that do support the global warming theory, to say they have no vested interest is false. A good number of scientists and lab's are government funded. There's a vested interest straight away.
You could form a club with Leonidas though. Or some kind of right-wing situation comedy. Leinad & Leonidas. Writes itself.
Oh, and so now I can simply be disregarded as right-wing because I dare to question what I'm spoon fed by governments whilst they raise green taxes and force ever more harsh financial penalties on people all in the name of global warming.
Leonidas is talking out of his ass, though. Sorry, Leonidas. You are talking out of your ass.
Anyone who now questions this idea of global warming and your carbon footprint are deneyed as modern day heretics.
And thank you to tommydski and Johnny C for proving my point.
And before anyone else starts. I never suggested that the human race down to an individual person shouldn't take more responsibility for it's actions. Of course people should. Reduce, reuse, recycle and all that good stuff. It is simply good sense. I'm in no way suggesting that people should be reckless and careless with the way they live their lives and what they leve in their wake. The sheer arrogance of the politicians/musicians/actors etc to put the responsibility for any change in world temperature squarely on our shoulders though it beyond a joke. The world has gone through so many drastic changes in temperature throughout it's long long life. Long before we were even emerging from a swamp in Africa. To think that we can in any way stop the Earth from going through its natural cycles is idiotic. If every factory, plane, car, etc stopped today and never produced another drop of CO2 the world will still carry on regardless.
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No, seriously.
I was going to say something about this in the last post but I figured you wouldn't be silly enough to focus on the point so here it is: Earth cooling down does not rule out climate change. Whether it gets colder or warmer is irrelevant as long as that change is caused by us. Jesus Christ. And have you even read past the headline of the article you linked to?
Scientists quoted in a past DailyTech article link the cooling to reduced solar activity which they claim is a much larger driver of climate change than man-made greenhouse gases. The dramatic cooling seen in just 12 months time seems to bear that out. While the data doesn't itself disprove that carbon dioxide is acting to warm the planet, it does demonstrate clearly that more powerful factors are now cooling it.
Let's hope those factors stop fast. Cold is more damaging than heat. The mean temperature of the planet is about 54 degrees. Humans -- and most of the crops and animals we depend on -- prefer a temperature closer to 70.
So that doesn't rule out CO2's harmful effects and it doesn't even rule out that we're fucking up the planet.
Incidentally, twenty years doesn't prove dick in terms of global warming. The Hadley Centre, responsible for the image in the article you linked, made this helpful image showing temperatures from about 150 years ago to a few years ago:
(http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/f/f4/Instrumental_Temperature_Record.png)
Here's a composite of temperatures culled from glacial records dating back four hundred years:
(http://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/paleo/pubs/oerlemans2005/fig3a.jpg)
Please note the periods of warming and cooling that are then superseded by the century-long period of extreme warming that is unparalleled in the half-millennium before it and neatly coincides with the invention of things like the automobile.
And who is being fucking spoon-fed by their governments here? The American and Canadian governments have both pulled out of Kyoto and proven non-committal at best on the subject of climate change. I can't speak for everyone in this thread but having looked at a bunch of the research and approximately zero cartoons on the subject by noted ignoramuses Cox & Forkum that I have come to the conclusion on my own that humanity is doing its best through massive consumption of resources to ruin this planet's environment, that climate change is likely happening because of it and quite frankly CO2 might be a red herring compared to all the other shit we dump into the earth, air and oceans and therefore we should be tremendously fucking concerned and maybe rethink the way we as a society deal with our planet's resources. I came to this conclusion on my own.
I've already said it but I'll repeat it, you're talking out of your ass, and I'm not saying that because you disagree with me. I've been in plenty of disagreements on this forum and they don't necessarily involve someone talking out of their ass. You're talking out of your ass.
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H20 in it's gaseous state is also a relatively strong contributer to the greenhouse effect and once things start getting hotter, they keep getting hotter and hotter. It snowballs, so all we can do is just prepare for the storm and learn because, what we're experiencing is the combination of cumulative effect of human "progress" and earth's normal environmental/meteorological trends.
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You could form a club with Leonidas though. Or some kind of right-wing situation comedy. Leinad & Leonidas. Writes itself.
Oh, and so now I can simply be disregarded as right-wing because I dare to question what I'm spoon fed by governments whilst they raise green taxes and force ever more harsh financial penalties on people all in the name of global warming.
Actually that was just a joke. I thought that was pretty obvious. You both have similar names and you showed a (momentary) appreciation for a right-leaning comic. That's the joke.
Think whatever the chuffing heck you want about climate change, I've made no comment in either direction regarding its credibility.
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How has anyone been proven wrong???
I agree that nothing's been proven, but the evidence is still in favor of global warming being man-made.
Don't get me started on this "global warming" crap. Anyone who now questions this idea of global warming and your carbon footprint are deneyed as modern day heretics.
This is the same persecution bullshit that Intelligent Design proponents spout about evolution.
The fact that this global warming argument is an easy ticket for governments and companies to drastically throw up prices, increase legislation, and essentially piss all over the average man and woman are simply ignored in what has become a super fashionable movement.
You know this is a popular conspiracy theory, right? In league with fluoridated water mind-control and 9-11 being an inside job?
Also, the fact that governments are capitalizing on global warming hysteria to pass laws and increase taxes has absolutely nothing to do with the legitimacy of global warming. It speaks more to the fact that our government acts in its own interests rather than that of its people. It's fine to believe in an unpopular cause, but at least do it for a good reason.
Yes of course there is climate change, there always has been. Hell, they used to be able to ice skate across the Thames in London during the Tudor period it was so cold. Before that the the Romans would grow vines of grapes in Northern England in order to make wine. The world has always warmed up and cooled down in natural cycles. It's simply the sheer arrogance of man to believe that they can combat it in anyway and we can stop the earth itself simply doing its thing.....
It isn't arrogance if it's true. The fact is, humanity can change the earth globally. We've overfished vast areas of the ocean to the point of collapse, when we used to think that the ocean was so abundant that human activity could never affect it. We've actually removed a good fraction of oil from the crust, fast enough that we are running out of easily accessible supplies. It follows that we've also converted most of that oil into carbon dioxide, which is a proven greenhouse gas.
Is it not more arrogant to believe that everything will be ok if we don't restrain ourselves?
The fact is that we have been sold a lie. A lie which conveniently means that governments and big business can make even more money out of us, and what's more they can try and make us feel guilty about the very process.
By all means be green. Reduce, reuse, recycle and all that jazz. It makes good sense of course it does. Don't buy into the convenient lie however that you and I are to blame for what is a perfectly natural cycle the world goes through and then be made to pay for the privilege.
Back to the conspiracy theory! Just because someone's making money off of it, doesn't mean it's not real. It just means that people are gullible.
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Climate change is not proven, but it is a fucking certainty that carbon dioxide, methane, nitrous oxide and water vapour cause a greenhouse effect in our atmosphere. This is not arguable. This is scientific fucking fact. Ice cores also empirically prove that we are pumping utterly unprecedented amounts of these gases, particularly Co2, into the atmosphere. It's like if I'm standing in an underground petrol tank chainsmoking. I know that petrol is combustible. I know that when you contain a rapid release of gases it is a bomb. I know that my cigarette is a source of combustion. But those measly scientists can't prove that all they'll find is half my skull with my glasses fused on lodged up a tree two miles away, can they? Stupid fucking scientists, with their empiricism and experimental repeatability and peer review process. What do they know, eh?
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But when his only ethical option is Tipper, can you blame him?
Come on, she used to be a pretty lady! You can't blame a girl for looking like a middle aged lady when she is one.
(http://farm1.static.flickr.com/127/416826342_110e723316.jpg?v=0)
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Man, what dick thought up peak oil? Let's sue the fucker! It makes no sense at all that a finite natural resource could ever run out. Why the fuck are all these liberal faggots telling me I shouldn't use as much fucking energy as I like? They must hate America.
You know I've never even seen an Inconvenient Truth? I read books! Crazy huh?
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I am fucking infuriated at these liberal fucking faggots.
Let's have some fucking objectivity here for fucks sake
We are all prostitutes
Khar I am not fond of this uppity fucking viewpoint you have.
Who the fuck said you were allowed an opinion
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You're talking out of your ass.
Johnny, while I disagree with leonidas in his analysis of the situation, you are proving his point about being branded a heretic when you toss personal insults.
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Ok, in a very simplistic view on our future, depending on global warming existing or not there are four options
1: Global warming was all just a big hoax and we do nothing about it.
Result: We go on living just as we have, though eventually we run out of fossil fuels.
2: Global warming was all just a big hoax, but we act as if it wasn't.
Result: Our quality of living deteriorates for a while, but we are now attached to a renewable energy sauce.
3: Global warming exists and we act to counter it
Result: similar to 2
4: Global warming exists and we do nothing about it
Result: Life as we know it is wiped out.
Now I know 1 is the ideal option there. But personally I would much prefer to do something about it and end up with option 2 or 3, than end up with 4 because we were too busy praying it would be 1.
Why have we not talked more about how good of a post this is?
Let's talk about how good of a post this is.
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No, seriously.
I was going to say something about this in the last post but I figured you wouldn't be silly enough to focus on the point so here it is: Earth cooling down does not rule out climate change. Whether it gets colder or warmer is irrelevant as long as that change is caused by us. Jesus Christ. And have you even read past the headline of the article you linked to?
Right, so what are we talking here. Climate Change or Global Warming? I ask because it seems that you can pick and choose whatever one of these two catchy titles to suit whatever your argument may be at any given time. If we're talking climate change then I've already stated my point of view on that phenomenon. That it has happened throught the entire life of the Earth to date, with the Earth warming and cooling periodically, sometimes drastically. It's a completely natural cycle that the world goes through and we have no power at all to stop the Earth doing what it does.
The human race is prone to blind panic though. In the 1970's scientists were convinced that the next ice age was imminent. Now scientists (apparently "90 percent" of them) believe that the Earth is going to get hotter with sea levels rising and boiling us all to death. 30 years is absolutely nothing in the lifetime of the Earth, so how come the sudden drastic change in policy?
I've already said it but I'll repeat it, you're talking out of your ass, and I'm not saying that because you disagree with me. I've been in plenty of disagreements on this forum and they don't necessarily involve someone talking out of their ass. You're talking out of your ass.
You suit yourself.
How has anyone been proven wrong???
I agree that nothing's been proven, but the evidence is still in favor of global warming being man-made.
So what about the rise and fall of temperatures the Earth went through before man was even on the scene? What about the rising temperature of Mars? Is that our fault also????
The fact that this global warming argument is an easy ticket for governments and companies to drastically throw up prices, increase legislation, and essentially piss all over the average man and woman are simply ignored in what has become a super fashionable movement.
You know this is a popular conspiracy theory, right? In league with fluoridated water mind-control and 9-11 being an inside job?
Also, the fact that governments are capitalizing on global warming hysteria to pass laws and increase taxes has absolutely nothing to do with the legitimacy of global warming. It speaks more to the fact that our government acts in its own interests rather than that of its people. It's fine to believe in an unpopular cause, but at least do it for a good reason.
Actually it has a lot to do with the legitimacy of global warming. I can't overly comment on the American or Canadian goverments as I'm in the UK. The the whole thing is as cynical as hell. Governments treat us like idiots and they are hardly beyond using any means possible to use any chance they can get to increase their level of intrusion into our lives and ring more money out of us. This Global Warming panic is an absolute God-send for big business and governments alike. Especially as anyone who dares question their motives and the legitimacy of the global warming argument is ignored and ridiculed as someone who would kill us all!!!!
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1: Global warming was all just a big hoax and we do nothing about it.
Result: We go on living just as we have, though eventually we run out of fossil fuels.
Devil's advocacy ahoy - There are Geologists at work who disagree that oil is a fossil fuel. I don't really have the know-how or the patience to debate them but I have overheard this discussion for hours and hours on end. These are people who work in petro-science for a living and have six figure salaries incidentally. The general theory is that the formations from which we extract oil have been mistaken as the origin rather than the depository of oil. This is known as the Abiogenic Petroleum Theory (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abiogenic_petroleum_origin).
Personally I am inclined to disagree but what the hell do I know? Not much!
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Wasn't the Abiogenic theory invented by the Soviets?
You know, the same dudes who had a hard on for Lysenkoism? And Japhetic theory?
Bullshit ideology driven pseudoscience ahoy!
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Let me start off by saying I'm not a big fan of global warming as caused by humans. I want it to be just a natural thing for the earth to go through. I really really do. From basic understanding of all the effects of it though, I have figured out the simple pros and cons of how to act.
If it is as I wish it, and there is not much humans can do to stop it and:
~I act as it is a bunch of baloney: Nothing happens, I keep on keepin on
~I act as if its real: I pay a few more dollars to shush the eeeeeeeevil liberaaaaaals and make life a little more convenient for myself(good gas mileage cars especially)
If global warming is in our hands to effect and:
~I act as if it is a bunch baloney: I do my part to doom the planet, I keep on keepin on
~I act as if its real: I do my part to save the planet, and get a sweet car
I personally don't enjoy the thought of global warming, and on a side note, I thought some of those cartoons were at least amusing, if not exactly uproariously hilarious, but through it all, even someone who disagrees with it like I do, the most selfish plan of action would be to just go with the idea that its real. So when I can afford one, I'm gonna get a really good gas mileage car.
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But when his only ethical option is Tipper, can you blame him?
Come on, she used to be a pretty lady! You can't blame a girl for looking like a middle aged lady when she is one.
[img]http://farm1.static.flickr.com/127/416826342_110e723316.jpg?v=0[/]
Yeah, but maybe I'd like to be playing some decent music in the background during coitus! Or maybe I'd like to try an exotic position, or dirty talk her, or carve pentagrams into her chest... I mean I would just feel very restricted is all!
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Maybe we're look at global warming the wrong way!
Maybe we're just being rewarded for treating others the way we'd like to be treated, obeying stop signs, and curing diseases.
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How has anyone been proven wrong???
I agree that nothing's been proven, but the evidence is still in favor of global warming being man-made.
So what about the rise and fall of temperatures the Earth went through before man was even on the scene? What about the rising temperature of Mars? Is that our fault also????
No one is arguing that the earth doesn't undergo natural climate change. Geological and biological activity over geological time scales have changed the composition of the atmosphere to a great degree, causing warming and cooling, ice ages, etc. However, the scientific consensus on global warming is that it doesn't fit the pattern of past climate change. Also, consider that the data used to determine that the climate changed in the past is the same data that supports the theory of global warming.
Arguing that global warming is natural because the climate was different in the past is just a red herring.
Also, there is evidence that there is much more carbon dioxide in the atmosphere now than there was at the beginning of the industrial age, and that the increase in carbon dioxide is man-made because carbon from different sources has a different isotope profile.
If you accept that carbon dioxide is a greenhouse gas, then the increase in global average temperature over recent history supports the theory that global warming is man-made. Of course, this isn't proven, but it's what the evidence supports.
You know this is a popular conspiracy theory, right? In league with fluoridated water mind-control and 9-11 being an inside job?
Also, the fact that governments are capitalizing on global warming hysteria to pass laws and increase taxes has absolutely nothing to do with the legitimacy of global warming. It speaks more to the fact that our government acts in its own interests rather than that of its people. It's fine to believe in an unpopular cause, but at least do it for a good reason.
Actually it has a lot to do with the legitimacy of global warming. I can't overly comment on the American or Canadian goverments as I'm in the UK. The the whole thing is as cynical as hell. Governments treat us like idiots and they are hardly beyond using any means possible to use any chance they can get to increase their level of intrusion into our lives and ring more money out of us. This Global Warming panic is an absolute God-send for big business and governments alike. Especially as anyone who dares question their motives and the legitimacy of the global warming argument is ignored and ridiculed as someone who would kill us all!!!!
Again, I say: So what? Setting aside the fact that you're not offering any evidence that the government is participating in a conspiracy to defraud the public and just appealing to cynicism, how exactly does this invalidate the science? I mean, if I take advantage of a downpour to gouge people on the price of my umbrellas for sale, does it change the fact that it's raining?
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Joe, for the record, I haven't suggested anything else about Leonidas besides the idea that on this particular issue he's talking out of his ass. I'm not saying he's insane, I'm not calling him a heretic, but I am suggesting that his opinion is severely lacking in some information. In short, he's talking out of his ass. It's not even necessarily his fault that he's talking out of his ass, he might just not know all this stuff.
Oh boy I love internet arguments that turn into giant text blocks! I'll ellipsis your argument, Leonidas, because I don't want this to be unreadable.
Right, so what are we talking here ... we have no power at all to stop the Earth doing what it does.
The Earth has spent a hundred years, and in fact a hundred years out of the previous four hundred, warming up fairly drastically. There are other graphs dating back to the tenth century that show the exact same trend. Currently we are experiencing global warming. This is a symptom of climate change. Calling it "global warming" simplifies it down to one smaller component of a larger theory.
As Dennis said, nobody defending the notion of climate change, greenhouse gases and the like has suggested that the Earth does not experience periods of warming and cooling. What we (and, y'know, a good number of scientists) are suggesting is that human intervention especially over the last hundred years has significantly magnified the intensity of that warming and cooling, that the changes we are going to see will be especially drastic and sudden as opposed to relatively gradual.
30 years is absolutely nothing in the lifetime of the Earth, so how come the sudden drastic change in policy?
Science has progressed in thirty years. Better computers and more information gathered means we're able to make more accurate predictions based on more certain data. For example, here is a chart predicting the temperature of the Earth without human-created climate change factors (rendered in blue), predicting the temperature of the Earth with those factors (rendered in red) and illustrating the actual recorded temperature (the black line).
(http://www.ucar.edu/research/climate/images/pcmensembles2.jpg)
Incidentally, you'll notice that the temperature has also climbed fairly drastically over the last thirty years, probably causing scientists to go, "Hm, let's re-examine the evidence."
You suit yourself.
Thanks, I will. You're talking out of your ass.
What about the rising temperature of Mars? Is that our fault also????
Total red herring as well. Mars is a different planet with a different atmosphere and no long-term historical data to compare its current period of climate change, and besides that the climate change is restricted to one hemisphere that is experiencing massive dust storms at the moment. Change in that one area isn't necessarily indicative of change on the whole planet. Long story short, we only have the data to look at Earth's climate, and Earth's climate is seeing man-made change.
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I think what we'd really like to know is what your brother thinks of all this, Johnny.
But seriously, I agree with everybody who says that we should start making changes regardless of what we think about global warming. Isn't the basic definition of a good person the willingness of somebody to act in an ethically responsible manner regardless of need or consequence?
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Ozy just won a lifetime supply I red hot lovin'
Also, I posted in the Kenny mere seconds before reading this topic.
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and that the increase in carbon dioxide is man-made because carbon from different sources has a different isotope profile.
Could you link to, or reference where you got this information? I'm not trying to say it's incorrect or anything, just interested on reading up on this.
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Well Johhny C, I can also find graphs to "prove" whatever argument I wish to make. In fact for your one graph I'll raise you you Five.
(http://blogs.news.com.au/images/uploads/hadcrut-jan08_thumb.png)
This first graph is from the Hadley Centre of Britain’s Meteorological Office and one of the four bodies measuring world temperature.
As you see, since 1998—an unusually warm year thanks to the “El Nino” pool of warmer water in the Pacific—the world’s temperature dropped back to a steady plateau, followed by a few years of cooling.
(http://blogs.news.com.au/images/uploads/UAH_LT_since_1979_thumb.jpg)
The second graph confirms both the halt in warming, and then cooling. It’s from the University of Alabama in Huntsville, which monitors the troposphere—from the ground to 12km altitude.
Only one of the four bodies measuring world temperature, in fact, claims temperatures are still rising. That’s NASA, whose program is run by Dr James Hansen, Al Gore’s global warming adviser and a controversial catastrophist whose team’s reworking of data has been heavily criticised for exaggerating any heating.
(http://blogs.news.com.au/images/uploads/seaice25_thumb.gif)
This third graph seems to confirm a cooling. Despite media scare stories about a melting North Pole; sea ice has grown so fast in the southern hemisphere there is now more ice in the world than is usual, says the US National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.
(http://blogs.news.com.au/images/uploads/tc-graph-1969-2005_thumb.png)
Graph four shows us that global warming hasn't in fact given us more cyclones - or more tornadoes or hurricanes anywhere. Nor is their proof that cyclones are getting worse, according to the American Meteorological Society.
And, please, can we drop that old fiction that the world was never warmer? It’s a false claim made popular by a 2001 report of the IPCC, the United Nations’ climate group, which ran a graph, shaped like a hockey stick, claiming there was no warming for millennia until humans last century gassed up their world.
In fact, that “hockey stick” is now discredited, and last year Dr Craig Loehle, of the US National Council for Air and Stream Improvement, argued that using tree rings to work out past temperatures was clearly unreliable.
He instead produced a graph - Number 5 - of past temperatures using all other accepted proxies:
(http://blogs.news.com.au/images/uploads/loehle_fig3_thumb.jpg)
As this graph shows, and as I have already said, the world has gone though pervious periods where tempertaures rose. Where grapes were grown in the British Isles and farmers in Greenland grew crops on land now covered in snow.
Jonny C, you seem to place so much emphasis on what apparent scientists have had to say on the subject. So take into consideration the fact that 31,000 scientists, including world figures such as physicist Prof Freeman Dyson, atmospheric physicist Prof Richard Lindzen and climate scientist Prof Fred Singer, issued a joint letter in May 2008 warning governments not to jump on board the global warming bandwagon.
“There is no convincing scientific evidence that human release of carbon dioxide, methane, or other greenhouse gases is causing or will, in the foreseeable future, cause catastrophic heating of the earth’s atmosphere and disruption of the earth’s climate.”
That’s why Ivar Glaever, who won a Nobel Prize for Physics, in June 2008 declared “I am a sceptic”, because “we don’t really know what the actual effect on the climate is”.
And it’s why the American Physical Society this month said “there is a considerable presence within the scientific community of people who do not agree with the (Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change) conclusion that anthropogenic CO2 emissions are very probably likely to be primarily responsible for the global warming that has occurred since the Industrial Revolution.”
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JAu68OsFggw
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5weG9IllCpo&feature=related
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ictpPrle3EQ&feature=related
You might not take Penn and Teller to be the most scientific, and as everything and everyone there is a bias. Still, it's amusing.
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Is it that important what is causing the climate change (that is the term I am using as I don't give a shit about the cause)? We're at a point where if the world is getting significantly hotter because of the pollution we create then we have a responsibility to not only reduce the amount of shit we pump into the atmosphere (as well as everywhere else) but to figure out if there is not a way for us to slow the heating (these could be the same things). We're also at a point where even if the world is just getting hotter as part of a global warming/cooling cycle (I've heard people say that we're still on the tail end of the last Ice Age which is why it's heating up), that cycle could end up being very bad for us as a species and we should look at (and you know, enact) ways of either trying to slow that heating or at least to try to not speed it up.
Either way we're going to be running out of things to power the machines that keep us at the temperature we like being at sooner or later. We should try to look into that maybe?
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Is it that important what is causing the climate change (that is the term I am using as I don't give a shit about the cause)? We're at a point where if the world is getting significantly hotter because of the pollution we create.....
But Jimmy, that's the point. We're not!
If anything the raise (and cooling) of global temperatures have more to do with solar cycles.
(http://www.global-warming-and-the-climate.com/images/sunspot-lenght-&-teperature.gif)
(http://tamino.files.wordpress.com/2007/04/scycles.jpg)
(http://www.oar.noaa.gov/spotlite/archive/images/sunclimate_3b.gif)
You're being made to feel guilty and paying for the pleasure. Governments and business are making a fortune off of palying on people's guilt. It's really as simple as that. The vasst vast majority of the CO2 in the atmosphere is caused naturally. From everything to volcanic emmissions to dying plant material. NOT because you drive your car to work and use a dishwasher to get your dishes clean. Human CO2 emmissions only account for a tiny percentage of the CO2 in the earth's atmosphere. It's an absolute con.
All you have to do is look at Al Gore. The world's greatest climate change advocate. A man seen by many as an American hero and modern day prophet. The fact that his own expendature of energy from his mansion and jaunts around the world in private jets seem to make a mockery of what he stands for. The fact he's made millions from selling his powerpoint presentation DVD around the world and money from his own company, Generation Investment Management (which he set up two years before The Convenient Truth), which again makes money from the guilt people feel over global warming selling carbon credits (whatever the flyging f*** they are).
It's all bullshit and you're being taken for a ride. We all are.
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Wow Leonidas that is very convincing. Throwing tonnes of respect your way, just so you know. I mean Im not really going to write global warming off as a myth, rather you have convinced me to take a more Agnostic approach. Maybe it is being caused by us, maybe not, our limited science and limited history on this earth dont allow us enough information to inconclusively prove it. Though I maintain a global change in temperature either direction on the spectrum is likely to be a bad thing.
But right or wrong Id still rather err on the side of caution, not speaking strictly in Greenhouse Gas terms, but in general environmental terms. The worlds been here millions of years before we started significantly dump pollution into the atmosphere and oceans and pretty much everywhere. I cant but think it's making a negative effect, and after all life as we know it on earth started off as a chemical anomaly set to very very strict climatic values. Anything that MIGHT affect that, even if its warmer, or colder, cant be good for all life on this planet, animals have spent thousand to millions of years adapting to the world as it is, not the world as it may become.
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Goddamn this thread.
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Chesire Cat, that's the thing. I'm not trying to convince anyone that man-made climate change doesn't exist. The fact is we just don't know enought about it. As much as some people will pull out all this evidence to support the claim that we will all be doomed in 100 years time, there is also a weight of evidence to prove that man has very little if any influence over the world's weather conditions. That's the thing, we just don't know. The point is that the debate is not over, despite what so many catastrophists would have us believe.
Bringing the climate change issue down to an individual level in terms of responsibility however is wrong. I should not be made to feel guilty (and made to pay over the odds/suffer increased government legislation for the privilage) because I choose to drive a car rather than cycle and that occasionally I don't recycle as much as I could. To do so is a tactic that has been used for years by all major religions in order to make money, and this is nothing different. Guilt pays.
Of course we should all take more responsibility for the way we lives our lives, but don't be allowed to be made to feel guilty about it. not when climate change hero's such as Al Gore produces far more CO2 with his mansion and jetting all over the world in his private jet in order t recieve awards (which is nothing more than good advertising) in a year that you or I would probably produce in a lifetime.
Also, be aware of the fact that if the UK were to stop tomorrow and never start again. No more factories, no more planes or cars, no more washing machines etc etc.... In the developing world of India and China the slack created would be taken up within about 4 days. You or I have no power here to make any significant change. People like to believe that on an individual level they can, but they can't.
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Yes but not limiting our impact to climate change, its good for the soul to do things like recycling or biking.
Its like working out, you will feel better for it. Even if it doesnt make a difference in the realm of "North America is fat" etc
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Actually, Leonidas, if you looked for information at any other sources than the ones that blatantly pander to your predetermined view on the matter, you'd know that it's been proven and reported on numerous times in scientific journals that solar temperature increases on the scale that you've shown on the graph would only increase the temperature on earth by .01 degree Celsius. The earth has warmed by much, much more than that.
Further, the scientists who you said have a vested interest in propagating the existence of Global Warming--none of the scientists on the IPCC are paid by their government, or any other government for that matter. A large number of them volunteered. Some were asked to. A few well-known skeptics were asked to join the panel, and each and every one of them declined. If they believe so strongly that it's a hoax, why wouldn't they go to the main body debating the issue and present their case?
Have you even looked at the IPCC reports of the last ten years? Or have you just decided that you already know that it's going to be false and full of lies because you know the topic so much better than hundreds of the world's top scientists?
Also, your graphs contradict themselves. Some show the world cooling now, some show it warming, but not by as much as most conventional graphs or temperature increases show. For example, your first one shows a sudden drop in temperature at the beginning of this year; your 5th one shows a skyrocketing heatwave, though not above the peak further back in the graph. Your data doesn't even correlate. Cardinal rule of science: you can't take one aspect of a graph or of research that corresponds and ignore the parts that contradict each other.
Further, I don't know what world you're living in, but in America no governments or businesses are making money off of the reality of global warming, aside from some upstarts in the green technology field and some subsidies for solar and wind companies. We're in massive debt and many companies are being shut down because they can't afford the cost of energy. Businesses are losing money at a rate not seen in decades.
You can revel in your conspiracy theories all you want, but there's a severe lack in logic and scientific correlation in your arguments, and the fact that when someone calls you out on it you resort to banally shrieking about being labeled a "heretic" and such just proves it. I know it's "cool" to go against what's accepted by others, but pick your battles.
Really, the way you're acting is indecipherable from people who rant about 9/11 conspiracies.
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Jews cause global warming.
CASE CLOSED.
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I'd see a band called Furious Nerds. Ironically, they would play children's music.
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Leonidas claims that the University of Alabama is more of an authority on global climate change than NASA.
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He doesn't have any case, really.
Most silly lawsuits are thrown out. You hear about the litigious nature of American culture, but it doesn't really have a lot of weight. There's a lot of lawsuits that go around, but the really dumb ones never end up succeeding.
(If anyone bring up the McDonald's coffee lady, you're wrong. That was a legitimate lawsuit.)
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You don't always sue for damages, presumably he could be suing Gore to stop promoting something he perceives as untrue as fact.
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That would be laughed out of court. You can't get an injunction to get someone to stop saying something, unless it's libel. The constitution explicitly allows the right of people to say almost anything, whether someone else perceives it as untrue or not. So there's nothing preventing the dude from arguing his own line; it's just that no one believes him and he's pissed.
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How can you sue someone for saying things you perceive as untrue when it is largely political stuff Gore is saying. It's all relative with the exception of the science.
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You can't. You can go through all the motions of the suit, but once it hits anyone with authority, it'll be thrown out.
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Is it that important what is causing the climate change (that is the term I am using as I don't give a shit about the cause)? We're at a point where if the world is getting significantly hotter because of the pollution we create.....
But Jimmy, that's the point. We're not!
If anything the raise (and cooling) of global temperatures have more to do with solar cycles.
It's all bullshit and you're being taken for a ride. We all are.
Uh, I think you might need to re-read my post man. I was saying that the reason for this climate change is irrelevant and whatever the reason is we should be doing something about it.
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You or I have no power here to make any significant change. People like to believe that on an individual level they can, but they can't.
How come you're so pessimistic? Besides, we have more power together, hence countries and unions and such, and things like the Kyoto Protocol. Plus it doesn't matter if you think you make a difference or not, you're responsible and accountable for your own actions and you should be the change you want to see in the world. I hope you don't really think you're helpless.
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Guys, here are my personal beliefs:
I believe that humans have an impact on the environment that is too complex to measure accurately.
I believe that part of this impact may result in an effect on the global climate.
I believe that a large part of climate change is not a result from that.
I believe that the solution to climate change isn't in conservation, but in better science.
I believe that we should consider the possibility that we are going to have to radically change our lives in the future to live well.
I believe that the human race survives, no matter what. (Short of the Large Hardon Collider creating a black hole that kills us all)
I believe in Harvey Dent.
Here is what I do:
I walk everywhere.
I use energy saving everygoddamnthing.
I turn off all extraneous electronics and lights.
I water plants sparingly (this is more a New Mexican issue, but whatever).
I support conservation and alternative energy with my votes.
I travel as little as possible and always in carpools.
Why do I do this when I don't believe it's the answer or possibly not even the cause?
Because I'd be a major league dick if I were wrong(and it also saves an ass-ton of money).
I don't understand why people can't just do things because it's a good thing to do without being a dick about it.
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I believe that we should consider the possibility that we are going to have to radically change our lives in the future to live well.
I believe that the human race survives, no matter what.
This is the point. There is plenty of evidence that the climate is changing in a way that will seriously impact human society (especially at sea-level); whether humans caused or drive this change is somewhat beside the point. The important thing is to understand that unless we put flexibility back into being human, lots of people, and hence global society, will be hurt by these changes. Humans have survived and spread by being flexible, which means acknowledging their interaction with their environment; the humans that survive may well be those that don't require piped water and energy to live.
Paul
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Ozy is a major factor in global warming because he's so hot.
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Just saw this on another forum, posted by a fellow who is clearly not a fan of Al Gore:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HKVkgY45eLU
I was struck by the part about there being 30,000 scientists, and supporting the scientists are 9,000 PHD researchers. Wait, so if only a fraction of the "scientists" have doctorates, what exactly is their definition of a scientist? I mean, is every tom-dick-and-harry with a vested interest in the global warming debate considered a scientist?
Given that bit of hand waving, I'm rather leery of the "9000 PHd researchers" bit too. I mean, I'm sure they really do have 9000 people with PHds lined up, but PHds in what?
Just more denialist junk the same as the creationists put out.
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I think the thing to remember is that if we're not careful, we could end up in a Waterworld situation. I don't think anyone wants that, do you?
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I think that's a double edged sword really. I mean, sure it'd be like we were starring in waterworld for eternity, but it would also mean that every copy of waterworld would have been destroyed.
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No one is arguing that the earth doesn't undergo natural climate change. Geological and biological activity over geological time scales have changed the composition of the atmosphere to a great degree, causing warming and cooling, ice ages, etc. However, the scientific consensus on global warming is that it doesn't fit the pattern of past climate change. Also, consider that the data used to determine that the climate changed in the past is the same data that supports the theory of global warming.
Since when has it been scientific consensus? I've already stressed and explained that in no way is the theory of man made global warming a definate.
Arguing that global warming is natural because the climate was different in the past is just a red herring.
No. It is in fact a precedent. Proof that the temperature has always changed and always will. Long before man had any influence over the world at all.
Also, there is evidence that there is much more carbon dioxide in the atmosphere now than there was at the beginning of the industrial age, and that the increase in carbon dioxide is man-made because carbon from different sources has a different isotope profile.
Depends on where you get your sources. I've read in a bumber of places that man-made CO2 in the earths atmosphere accounts for somewhere between 1-3% of the total, the rest occurring naturally.
If you accept that carbon dioxide is a greenhouse gas, then the increase in global average temperature over recent history supports the theory that global warming is man-made. Of course, this isn't proven, but it's what the evidence supports.
Again, what evidence? There is evidence that the global temperature of the earth has cooled (hence the need to use the term climate change now) in the past 12-24 months after a period where it did rise. There is also proof (that I have already shown a glimpse of) that the earths temperature has more to do with solar activity than anything man made.
You know this is a popular conspiracy theory, right? In league with fluoridated water mind-control and 9-11 being an inside job?
Also, the fact that governments are capitalizing on global warming hysteria to pass laws and increase taxes has absolutely nothing to do with the legitimacy of global warming. It speaks more to the fact that our government acts in its own interests rather than that of its people. It's fine to believe in an unpopular cause, but at least do it for a good reason.
Actually it has a lot to do with the legitimacy of global warming. I can't overly comment on the American or Canadian goverments as I'm in the UK. The the whole thing is as cynical as hell. Governments treat us like idiots and they are hardly beyond using any means possible to use any chance they can get to increase their level of intrusion into our lives and ring more money out of us. This Global Warming panic is an absolute God-send for big business and governments alike. Especially as anyone who dares question their motives and the legitimacy of the global warming argument is ignored and ridiculed as someone who would kill us all!!!!
Again, I say: So what? Setting aside the fact that you're not offering any evidence that the government is participating in a conspiracy to defraud the public and just appealing to cynicism, how exactly does this invalidate the science? I mean, if I take advantage of a downpour to gouge people on the price of my umbrellas for sale, does it change the fact that it's raining?
Well, what if it wasn't actually raining but you could convince people that it was, and also convince them that it was their own fault? You bombard them with so called sicentific proof and feel off their guilt and then go and introduce an umbrella tax of course.
Also, your graphs contradict themselves. Some show the world cooling now, some show it warming, but not by as much as most conventional graphs or temperature increases show. For example, your first one shows a sudden drop in temperature at the beginning of this year; your 5th one shows a skyrocketing heatwave, though not above the peak further back in the graph. Your data doesn't even correlate. Cardinal rule of science: you can't take one aspect of a graph or of research that corresponds and ignore the parts that contradict each other.
You're missing the point, which is of course that the argument about global warming/climate change is far from over and far from proven. The point is that there is so much so called evidence out there that contradicts other sources. And it's not my data. I didn't perform any scientific research with which to come to any conclusions.
Leonidas claims that the University of Alabama is more of an authority on global climate change than NASA.
I don't remember claiming anything of the sort. I would appreciate it if you wouldn't make claims against myself which are untrue.
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You might not take Penn and Teller to be the most scientific, and as everything and everyone there is a bias. Still, it's amusing.
Thank you for introducing me to this show, some of the other episodes are hilarious. The hippies in the dolphin episode were so ridiculous, and the bit in the immigration episode where they had illegal immigrants build a wall and then race to the other side was amazing.
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Ergh, Penn and Teller.
Funny show but really suspect from a political and ethical perspective. If you watch closely they don't really do a lot of work examining the evidence from the other side. This is apparent in the recycling episode, for example, when they interview someone from the Competitive Enterprise institute who explains why recycling is bad for everyone, and then they interview... someone who works at a recycling plant.
Awesome research guys, good work.
Wait, what's that? World Peace is bullshit? Gun control is bullshit? Secondhand smoke is bullshit? Hair is bullshit? uhhhhhhh
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Seriously though, good for them for attacking America's dolphin interests. It's about time someone did something that matters to the people.
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ohgod this thread is back.
grow up.
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It's a perfectly well mannered debate Red Lion. There were points made direct to myself and I addressed them. If you don't want to reply and want the thread to die off then just don't reply to it. Rather than throw a hissy fit about it.
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bullshit! has its moments here and there (the john edwards episode from the first season was excellent), but mostly it is a pretty silly and inaccurate show intended to be humorous. they are fucking amazing magicians though.
unrelated but kind of awesome - penn's daughter's middle name is CrimeFighter.
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The episode where they get people to sign a petition to ban dihydrogen monoxide is particularily great.
oo which episode is that? Back in chem lab we used to have a poster warning about the dangers of dihydrogen monoxide.
it is a pretty silly and inaccurate show intended to be humorous
All the sequences of Penn and Teller manhandling nude models gave it away.
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Lets (http://www.vbs.tv/shows.php?show=1127) talk (http://www.vbs.tv/shows.php?show=1154) about (http://www.vbs.tv/shows.php?show=1128) the (http://www.vbs.tv/shows.php?show=1129) environment! (http://www.vbs.tv/shows.php?show=1178)
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But Jimmy, that's the point. We're not!
If anything the raise (and cooling) of global temperatures have more to do with solar cycles.
(http://www.global-warming-and-the-climate.com/images/sunspot-lenght-&-teperature.gif)
(http://tamino.files.wordpress.com/2007/04/scycles.jpg)
(http://www.oar.noaa.gov/spotlite/archive/images/sunclimate_3b.gif)
These graphs are all misleading, using cherrypicked data for anti-global-warming propaganda.
The first graph compares a second order trend to a first order trend, which has problems in itself, since the data sets aren't exactly compatible.
This link (http://www.cdc.noaa.gov/cgi-bin/Pressure/tsanalysis.pl?tstype1=23&tstype2=16&year1=1854&year2=2008&itypea=0&axistype=0&anom=0&plotstyle=0&climo1=&climo2=&y1=&y2=&y21=&y22=&length=&lag=&iall=0&iseas=0&mon1=0&mon2=11&Submit=Calculate+Results) shows the data compared with a common x-axis.
They are comparing the length of a sunspot cyle (which is on the order of 12 years) to changes in land temperature (which is called a "temperature anomaly" in the graph). Land temperature readings are not "global average temperature". They pretend that the two are equivalent, but they're not. The source paper for the graph doesn't get any more specific about how the "temperature anomaly" was recorded. The source paper also states that they didn't compare to air temp."to avoid the lag by several years of air temperatures over the oceans, due to their large heat capacity". Indeed. It's a simple matter to lag the data several years to show a correlation. Considering how butchered the axes are in the graph already, their excuse does not ring true. A trend is a trend.
The second graph is the same data as the first graph. It doesn't show any new information. They did further rejigger the x-intercepts to make the plots line up how they like. If you had actually studied the graphs, instead of uncritically accepting what these propaganda sites are feeding you, you'd have noticed this.
The third graph commits the same error as the first graph. It measures surface temperature against solar activity, rather than global average temperature. In this case, instead of the land, it's the ocean.
Know your propaganda, kids!
[edited to remove some speculation on my part]
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I love how he says "We've been trying to get a debate going."
There's already been a debate. You've been proven wrong, and consequently lost.
It's the exact same tactic creationists use.
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The episode where they get people to sign a petition to ban dihydrogen monoxide is particularily great.
oo which episode is that? Back in chem lab we used to have a poster warning about the dangers of dihydrogen monoxide.
That was such a great joke when it first started, but God has it overstayed its welcome. [Jeph's meme shirt comes to mind here]
@Oerdin
Comparing somebody with a potentially rational argument to a creationist is just wrong. My stance is that I don't give a shit how legitimate global warming is, take every goddamn precaution because they will do the world nothing but good, but come on, mr.
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I have a question. Why has global warming suddenly become such a big topic? Isn't it the same thing as the greenhouse effect? And hasn't that been pretty accepted for more than a decade? Why now?
I honestly don't know which side I am on in regards to global warming, because I haven't taken the time to study anything for myself, and just about everyone that makes graphs has an agenda, which means I have to filter through what they want me to think to find what evidence there really is on either side, and I got tired of that after two papers last semester. What I do know is that if you go from some place up in the mountains, with little to no auto traffic, and then go down to even a city with relatively clean air, you are going to be smelling something really bad for a while. That is why I want lowered amounts of pollution, because I want those places to stay smelling good for as long as they can.
One thing that bugs me, though, is the people that talk about how they want to save the earth. That seems pretty arrogant to me, saving the earth? The earth has been around longer than us, and will be around after us, most likely. As Carlin said, the planet is fine, the people are fucked. If you are going to espouse an environmentalist point of view, don't say that you are saving the world, you are saving your own ass, if not your own, than your children's, or their children's.
edit: I think this topic needs to go to DISCUSS.
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I agree that we are not fighting to save the Earth, life has proven to be incredibly adaptable, and will probably go on in one form or another for the next five billion years. I learned about the Greenhouse effect and the possibility it might have on raised sea levels when I was in primary school around 1995. It might only have been reaching hysteria levels lately because there have been massive trends towards corporate environmental responsability in the last five years or so, but people have been anticipating a problem for a while now.
Also attitudes towards environmentalism in general have escalated in this decade, could be because the idea of a new millenium inspires ideas of a new order and a new way of doing things, but its just speculation as to why the average man and woman in the street have been having their buttons pressed about this recently
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So far dennis is winning this thread by actually analyzing data himself rather than just quoting.
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edit: I think this topic needs to go to DISCUSS.
Why? Not every "serious" thread needs to be in that forum.
Anyway, I think the reason that global warming has become a "hot" topic (C WHUT I DID?) is that the evidence has continued to mount in recent years that the changes that were predicted by the greenhouse effect have been proceeding at a pace that was not accounted for. The melting and warming has been occurring at so rapid a rate that no one's really sure if anything we do at this point is going to have an effect in stopping the potentially devastating consequences that are coming.
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I have a question. Why has global warming suddenly become such a big topic? Isn't it the same thing as the greenhouse effect? And hasn't that been pretty accepted for more than a decade? Why now?
Global warming isn't the same thing as the Greenhouse effect. The GH effect is central to GW theory, but isn't equivalent. All the GH effect states is that certain compounds in the atmosphere cause it to retain heat, which is something that can be directly demonstrated, unlike GW theory.
GW has been a popular controvery for at least a couple of decades, but things like the recent US election campaigns, second Iraq War, high energy prices, significant weather phenomena and the rise of the internet has pulled it to the forefront. Ironically, those things are mostly fluff and speculation. Things like documented sea level rises that inundate small island nations like Tuvalu (where the .tv domain comes from) that are serious have made barely a blip. A lot of the "awareness" that people have now is simply a fad.
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Shouldn't this get moved to DISCUSS?
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shouldn't you get moved to shut up
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I might leave this thread here, out of spite.
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shouldn't you get moved to shut up
watch out man your lf is showing
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Man it doesn't affect me one teensy weensy eensy bit where this thread is. Calm down!
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No, you shut up!
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Okay, so, hydrogen cars. Emit only water vapor. Promising. But here is something I wonder. I live in a fairly arid region, what happens when we get thousands of cars emitting water vapor? Seems to me that it could cause quite a notable rise in humidity and rainfall.
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Better than toxic rain, no?
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Man, seems that living in a desert, breathing all that water vapour, letting it all escape from your house, watering plants and shit would cause a notable rise in humidity and rainfall?
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Okay, so, hydrogen cars. Emit only water vapor. Promising. But here is something I wonder. I live in a fairly arid region, what happens when we get thousands of cars emitting water vapor? Seems to me that it could cause quite a notable rise in humidity and rainfall.
Water vapor at ground level would quickly condense as it loses heat to the surrounding air and turn into liquid water.
Also, it wouldn't be much water. It would be a simple matter to condense the exhaust in the manifold and capture the water, which could later be electrolyzed back into H2 and O2, assuming we come up with an efficient method of electrolysis. Also, I guess you could just drink it.
Wate is also a greenhouse gas.
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Man, energy does not work that way. The energy required to get pure hydrogen would be way more than the energy gained from the pure hydrogen, this is basic physics people, come on, ask your local laws of thermodynamics.
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To be fair I think the dude was just talking hypothetical uses rather than postulating a perpetual motion loop.
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Bottom line is water as a greenhouse gas is far less damaging to the environment and everything else as CO2 and or Nuclear Waste, and Lithium Ion batteries are tricky to dispose of and expensive to replace.
I guess technically power from wind or solar sources charging a battery powered vehicle wouldnt be so bad, but I put my money of Full Cells as the smart tech. That and riding Rat-Cyborgs to work.
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Man, energy does not work that way. The energy required to get pure hydrogen would be way more than the energy gained from the pure hydrogen, this is basic physics people, come on, ask your local laws of thermodynamics.
Yes, but a self-sustained factory powered by perhaps wind, water, or another renewable source could be put to good use as a dedicated hydrogen plant. This could be used to create massive amounts in a clean way (that does not rape the environment quite in the way of battery technology).
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Man, energy does not work that way. The energy required to get pure hydrogen would be way more than the energy gained from the pure hydrogen, this is basic physics people, come on, ask your local laws of thermodynamics.
Energy conversion is a fact of life. We can use very little energy directly for modern tech, so we must convert it (wasting some of it in the process) to something that is convenient and steady. The reason hydrogen is a good fuel source is that it is a good storage medium for that converted energy (high energy density, but it has other problems, like leaking out of virtually anything you put it into and causing corrosion in steel). So, there's nothing wrong with storing energy from less available sources in H2. Use solar or whatever to crack water, and there you go.
Fuel cells are the same idea.
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Ah, trapping it would work, I was just thinking that in arid large cities like, oh, say, denver, having a couple hundred thousand cars emitting water vapor every day could make a difference. However, unless you get the hydrogen from water, wouldn't the water emitted eventually cause a noticeable change? I know that around here, we would be glad for the extra water, but I doubt that goes for everyone everywhere.
Are the people working on fuel cell tech thinking of using water, or something else? I know you can dissolve aluminum in some solution or another to get hydrogen, but water would be more plentiful, and some of it is in less demand than aluminum.
Khar, unless my elementary school education has betrayed me, we breathe out co2, don't we? So of course having all our industries and vehicles emit co2 won't cause any noticeable difference, we have been breathing out co2 for millions of years (or 6000, depending on who you ask), and no problems so far. Oh wait...
Hmm... Using fusion power to split water, if they found a way to set aside the tritium and deuterium from the rest of the hydrogen, which shouldn't be difficult, they figured out how to separate U-235 from 238, use the deut and trit to power the fusion plants, it obviously wouldn't go anywhere near maintaining itself, but the drain would be somewhat slower at least. Of course, that wouldn't work for another 50 years or so, less if the Japanese ITER facility gets running soon. More if it ends up being a dead end, but lets not be so negative.
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Hmm... Using fusion power to split water, if they found a way to set aside the tritium and deuterium from the rest of the hydrogen, which shouldn't be difficult, they figured out how to separate U-235 from 238, use the deut and trit to power the fusion plants, it obviously wouldn't go anywhere near maintaining itself, but the drain would be somewhat slower at least. Of course, that wouldn't work for another 50 years or so, less if the Japanese ITER facility gets running soon. More if it ends up being a dead end, but lets not be so negative.
Wait, are we still talking about cars here? 'Cause if we are than you're not really making any sense.
What's the point you're trying to make here?
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Khar, unless my elementary school education has betrayed me, we breathe out co2, don't we? So of course having all our industries and vehicles emit co2 won't cause any noticeable difference, we have been breathing out co2 for millions of years (or 6000, depending on who you ask), and no problems so far. Oh wait...
You know when your breath on a piece of glass or a mirror and it mists?
Think for a second why that is.
Then maybe try knowing what the fuck you are talking about.
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Vendeta, that was me talking about how you get the hydrogen to run the cars, Deuterium and Tritium are isotopes of hydrogen that are currently expected to be used for fusion power, I was thinking that as you create hydrogen, if you run it through something afterwards to separate the different isotopes of hydrogen, you could sift out the deuterium and tritium and save that for use in the power plant, using the other hydrogen for the fuel cell.
Khar, you breathe out water vapor, I will grant you that, but don't avoid the response by insulting me.
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You know when your breath on a piece of glass or a mirror and it mists?
Think for a second why that is.
Then maybe try knowing what the fuck you are talking about.
What is the deal lately man? You've been like this for like a month. The first two lines are spot on, and then you go and post that third line.
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Deuterium and Tritium are isotopes of hydrogen
yes
that are currently expected to be used for fusion power
well they already are used in fusion, just not extensively.
I was thinking that as you create hydrogen, if you run it through something afterwards to separate the different isotopes of hydrogen
I'd like to clarify that by "create" you mean "liberate through the combustion of fuel". I know it's pedantic, but conservation of energy and all.
This is where your statement stops making sense though:
you could sift out the deuterium and tritium and save that for use in the power plant, using the other hydrogen for the fuel cell
There are several things wrong with this.
1)Isolating isotopes is expensive and difficult, and in tritium's case impossible (see 2)
2)Though Deuterium is fairly numerous, Tritium has a half life of only twelve years and is found only minutely in nature
2a)Tritium is produced through the bombardment of nitrogen with neutrons.
3)I cannot tell whether you are suggesting the power plant be a part of the automobile
3a)If you are, it should be noted that nuclear power plants are outrageously complicated and expensive, and this could absolutely never work
3b)If you are not, are you suggesting that people should handle radioactive materials on a daily basis?
-Note that tritium has a low decay energy and can only release beta radiation and is thus relatively safe. Note also that most people should still not handle it because they are incompetent.
If this sounded aggressive I apologize, I have a way of sounding rude when I don't intend to be.