The end of high powered cars?

[happy and angry]

Wow, guys. I, uh, don't really know where to start here.

I used the words "global climate change" for a reason, because "global warming" is a bit of a misnomer. Warming effects in some areas can (and do) have localized cooling effects in others. Weather systems are one big huge interrelated system, and you can't change one area without altering another, and you can't always predict the short term results.

However, there is still no significant disagreement in the scientific community as to whether or not the earth is warming. There is no significant disagreement in the scientific community as to whether or not the earth's climate is changing. Scientists and researchers around the world are in agreement on this. There is still disagreement as to the anthropogenic nature of climate change, although this debate is also rapidly coming to a close. The debate now is "What the hell do we do about it?"

That link you provided me, dkswim? Do you know anything about the Heartland institute? They are a conservative/libertarian thinktank. And anything they say about this issue is immediately suspect for several reasons. They have members on their board from companies like GM. They received thousands of dollars a year in funding from ExxonMobil. They release papers stating that global warming is a lie and claim scientists agree with this stance and they do it without permission of the people they claim support them, people/scientists who subsequently ask to have their name removed from the paper to which the Heartland Institute replies "No." There is an enormous conflict of interest there, but you go ahead and think it's a reasonable source for information on the subject.

Where as if you go to a relatively un-politicized source without conflicts of interest born from corporate funding like, say, the EPA, you get a very different (and far better sourced story):

http://www.epa.gov/climatechange/science/futuretc.html

In any event. Climate change is no longer the debate. It hasn't been for years. Global temperature has increased more over the last 30 years than it should have given variations in solar cycles, glaciers are retreating, precipitation patterns are changing, arctic sea ice has receded, severe weather events are on the rise, it all coincides with the industrial revolution and there are clear relationships we can see between the development of our industrial base and the increase in temperature, etc etc etc. There is so much evidence to support the idea that climate change is happening, and so very little (unbiased) evidence to refute it. Disagree with it if you want, but you may as well be refuting the existence of gravity.

I don't say this out of some crazy hippy desire to save the planet. I don't think the planet needs saving, it'll take care of itself same as it always has. I think that the development of our society has depended a lot on a certain environmental/weather status quo, however, that we would be foolish not to consider the consequences we may face. There's the obvious stuff like coastal flooding, but other things like drought and famine concern me more. If weather and precipitation patterns change enough so that crop land like the corn belt or the Canadian prairies are no longer able to sustain crops, we've got a problem. If fresh water is displaced because of new rain patterns, we've got a problem. If deserts grow and livable areas shift further and further north away from the equator, we've got a problem. If weather in the Mexican penninsular and the southern coast of the US becomes so severe that living in those areas is no longer feasible, we've got a problem. That's the direction we're heading, and we're heading there faster than we can really respond or adapt to at this point, and that's going to cause all kinds of problems like famine, disease, population displacement, civil unrest as resources become either more scarce or displaced. The financial costs to us will be high, and I think we need to find a solution to this problem that is reasonable, sustainable, and does not involve too many sacrifices or changes in our lifestyles.

If you're going to pretend there is no problem, though, you are very much on the wrong side of the debate.

 

[08cosmic3]

Al Gore owns companies selling carbon credits. Conflict of interest?

University scientist get millions of dollars from politicians to study Global Warming. Conflict of interest?

EPA gets it's money from Politicians. Conflict of interst?

Climate change covers everything now doesn't it? You can't loose if you say the climate will change.

What is the optimal temperature for the Earth?

The most diverse place on the planet is the rain forests, 90-100 degrees year round.

Don't get me wrong I'm an outdoorsman and have been all my life. We need to shift the focus on real envirnmental concerns like China, India and Russia with almost no industrial polution controls. The more we surpress industry here, where we have tougher standards, the more we send the industry to countries that have week standards. Cap and trade here will only send jobs and industry to those countries. The polution will increase and our jobs will decrease.

I personally don't understand why activist think they can/should contol sea level. If the oceans rise doesn't that create more habitat for the really smart animals on our planet like whales and dolphins.

 

[happy and angry]

You're missing the point. There is no optimal temperature for the Earth. There is no optimal sea height for the Earth. No one wants to "control" them. There are many things that currently interact in such a way that are beneficial to us. There are definitely optimal conditions for the environment for us. We really don't want these interactions to change drastically.

Fairly simple example: Ocean currents are driven in large part by rapid cooling at the poles because of the ice there. If the ice melts enough that the rapid cooling/sinking of water at the poles no longer happens, currents change, which means that weather changes drastically (think La Nina or El Nino only oceanwide). Seasonal migrations of fish that depend on warm/cold currents to transport nutrients to feeding areas get messed up. Predators and other animals that depend on these seasonal migrations get messed up. Do you know how many people world wide depend on fishing to as a food source, or as an industry?

90-100 degree rain forests are great for diversity, less good for farm land, crop land, habitation, development, industrialization, etc etc etc.

And actually no most of those funding "issues" you raised are not actually conflicts of interests. University scientists get money from (relatively) unpoliticized government programs to study things, and are not told what to study. The EPA is a (relatively) unpoliticized government body with a very clear mandate to pursue, regardless of which party is in power and what their political views are. There is a difference between "I have a vested interest in making sure that my industry remains relatively unregulated so that I can continue to make a lot of money" followed by disseminating misleading or outright false data under the guise of expertise in the subject matter, and, uh, publicly funded research grants that produce peer reviewed scientific research.

 

[thefrog1394]

.

 

[08cosmic3]

Al Gore is disseminating false data about sea level rise being 20 feet and now the UN even says it will be 6 inches under worst case. Much of Al's movie has been disproven but schools still require kids to watch it as a nocumentary.

If all the ice at the north pole were to melt the sea level would not rise one milimeter. Do you agree with this statement?

If there is no known optimal temp for Earth then maybe the warming is a good thing. It was much warming in the days of the dinosaurs and they were the most successful species to ever inhabit the earth.

It's wrong to assume that changes in the climate are good or bad, just changes. Plants and animals will adapt or become extinct. This is and will be as it has always been.

Universities will not continue to get funding if they come back and say there is nothing to worry about. A good crisis is good for them.

 

[dkswim]

that explains it the dinos were driving around in there suvs thats why it was hotter back then.

JK

 

[squidmotion]

Al Gore is disseminating false data about sea level rise being 20 feet and now the UN even says it will be 6 inches under worst case. Much of Al's movie has been disproven but schools still require kids to watch it as a nocumentary.

If all the ice at the north pole were to melt the sea level would not rise one milimeter. Do you agree with this statement?

If there is no known optimal temp for Earth then maybe the warming is a good thing. It was much warming in the days of the dinosaurs and they were the most successful species to ever inhabit the earth.

It's wrong to assume that changes in the climate are good or bad, just changes. Plants and animals will adapt or become extinct. This is and will be as it has always been.

Universities will not continue to get funding if they come back and say there is nothing to worry about. A good crisis is good for them.

i am squidmotion... and i approve of this message.

 

[happy and angry]

Al Gore is disseminating false data about sea level rise being 20 feet and now the UN even says it will be 6 inches under worst case. Much of Al's movie has been disproven but schools still require kids to watch it as a nocumentary.

Why are you talking about Al Gore? I'm not.

If all the ice at the north pole were to melt the sea level would not rise one milimeter. Do you agree with this statement?

Nope. It'll rise. Not much, but it will rise. There's not a lot of ice on land, it's mostly sea ice, so the volume of ice in the north is already part of the volume of the seas. There are some land based ice deposits in Greenland and Iceland, and on some of the islands in northern Canada that could melt and raise ocean levels, but not that much. Now, if the ice at the south pole were to melt, there'd be a problem with sea levels rising, but thankfully that doesn't appear to be happening.

The bigger concern is that as polar sea ice melts, the cooling effect it has on water that drives global ocean currents will be absent, which will have enormous world wide consequences.

If there is no known optimal temp for Earth then maybe the warming is a good thing. It was much warming in the days of the dinosaurs and they were the most successful species to ever inhabit the earth.

Maybe it would be a great thing, but, uh... not for us. We aren't dinosaurs. We depend on crops grown in temperate zones, animals and fish that exist in large numbers in temperate regions, atmospheric conditions vastly different from 65,000,000 years ago. I mean, the list of things go on and on.

It's wrong to assume that changes in the climate are good or bad, just changes. Plants and animals will adapt or become extinct. This is and will be as it has always been.

Just as it's wrong to assume that change isn't happening and isn't our fault. I've said that I agree with the "The Earth Will Take Care of Itself" concept repeatedly, throughout this conversation. My concern is not for some bird on the Island of Bumfuck in the Whogivesashit Sea, my concerns are almost entirely sociological/economical. If we alter the climate enough that fundamental building blocks of our society like farming and running water are no longer sustainable (and that is the direction we are going) in their current form/location things will get very bad for us, and that's just one of the possible consequences.

 

[Peter B]

how can i belive in global warming when the last fey years temps have been cooler localy we meet quiet a few low temp records. hell we had snow a couple times this year when thats very abnormal this area. how is it settled when a lot of major scientest dissagree with the science of it. the world has been hotter and it has been colder before. what is the main gas everyone says causes global warming? CO2. how come during the ice age we had some of the highest CO2 levals? im open to ideas im not nieve enough to not think we as the human race have and are changing the world.

read this http://www.heartland.org/books/PDFs/SurfaceStations.pdf
about validity of temp records.

don't be an ass clown. The point is not to stop CO2 from being released. The point is to control the levels and keep them at a level that the planet can handle. CO2 will always be released into the atmosphere. But if you take us out of the picture the planet exists in a balanced state where enough CO2 is filtered from the air to keep it from causing any real harm. Without humans on the planet it usually takes a catastrophic event to break this balance, although as science has proven, the earth's climate has changed on its own for other reasons as well.

Now add factories, cars, clear cutting of forests and everything else we do that pumps CO2 into the air at an alarming rate and the balance gets thrown off. That balanced system is what allows us to live on this planet. Throw it too far off and we die. Don't believe in global warming? Fine. Believe in this. CO2 causes holes in the ozone layer. Basic chemistry proves this fact. Enough holes in the ozone, and too much ultra violate and solar radiation gets through. Even if the temperature doesn't rise, that will kill all life on this planet. Again that fact is not up for debate, it can be proven a thousand times over.

Is this situation likely? At the moment no, but its common knowledge we already have several holes on the ozone layer. We are doing little to repair them by limiting greenhouse gasses.

When we die, as a species, this planet will repair itself. This is for our own good i don't understand why that is so hard for people to grasp.

And as for Al Gore. He's an idiot. Part of his dumb movie he talks about how in the past 15 years or so two manatees have been found far north on the east coast. One in jersey i think and the other off cape cod. TWO in 15 years. He uses this argument to say the water temperatures are heating up so much the manatees are getting confused and heading north. If it was a constant problem sure. But 2 in 15 years is just that. Two manatees that got lost. Al Gore is an propaganda slinging idiot just like the people telling you global warming is false.

 

[Super Unique]

global warming science is misguided at best. Disproven scientifically for a few years now.

example:

While I agree we should strive to maintain an ecological balance, CO2 emissions are the least of our worries.

 

[happy and angry]

Cite your source.

 

[GoFast]

Cite your source.

http://whatreallyhappened.com/IMAGES/greenhouse_sources3.gif

my source...right click>properties...

 

[happy and angry]

That's not a source. That's a link to an image that still does not reference a single damn source. I want to know where the data used in that image comes from.

EDIT: dear god don't even bother, it's from a conspiracy theory website. Oy vey, the eye rolling I've got going on here. Can we get a little intellectual honesty/rigor in a discussion about this, please?

 

[oaklandopen]

there was actually an awesome show about what would happen if humans suddenly dissappeared. it showed how the earth would sort of heal itself and how long certain stages would take like the complete removal of "human produced" pollutants. can't remember the title, but it was on one of those science channels like discovery or TLC.

 

[GoFast]

^^it's on history channel actually. It is a pretty cool show! There is an all new episode tonight.

 

[Peter B]

I hate conspiracy sites... 9/11 was a government plot, there were explosives in the towers... moon landing was a hoax.... the Russians never made it to space etc etc etc..... Their science and evidence is usually backed by rednecks who don't know the first thing about math, science, or the way the world actually works.

I believe in free speech but sometimes i wish it was based on IQ and how many degrees you have under your belt.

 

[djthom]

Why are you talking about Al Gore? I'm not.
Nope. It'll rise. Not much, but it will rise. There's not a lot of ice on land, it's mostly sea ice, so the volume of ice in the north is already part of the volume of the seas. There are some land based ice deposits in Greenland and Iceland, and on some of the islands in northern Canada that could melt and raise ocean levels, but not that much. Now, if the ice at the south pole were to melt, there'd be a problem with sea levels rising, but thankfully that doesn't appear to be happening.

The bigger concern is that as polar sea ice melts, the cooling effect it has on water that drives global ocean currents will be absent, which will have enormous world wide consequences.

Maybe it would be a great thing, but, uh... not for us. We aren't dinosaurs. We depend on crops grown in temperate zones, animals and fish that exist in large numbers in temperate regions, atmospheric conditions vastly different from 65,000,000 years ago. I mean, the list of things go on and on.

Just as it's wrong to assume that change isn't happening and isn't our fault. I've said that I agree with the "The Earth Will Take Care of Itself" concept repeatedly, throughout this conversation. My concern is not for some bird on the Island of Bumfuck in the Whogivesashit Sea, my concerns are almost entirely sociological/economical. If we alter the climate enough that fundamental building blocks of our society like farming and running water are no longer sustainable (and that is the direction we are going) in their current form/location things will get very bad for us, and that's just one of the possible consequences.

Are you sure this is what drives the currents? I thought it was the concentration of salt....

other than that i am in Happy and Angry's camp.

 

[oaklandopen]

ocean currents rely souly on the ppl who swim in the oceans. the less that ppl swim the slower the currents flow. and hurricanes always start out as african elephant farts

 

[Russm]

I'm looking forward to anti gravity myself, just hope I live long enough.

 

[oaklandopen]

cats and buttered toast theory:

the facts...
cats always land on their feet when dropped. buttered toast lands buttered side down when pushed off a table.

by merging a cat's feet to the buttered side of the toast you could push them off a table and they would be caught in a perpetual rotation due to a fight between both to hit the ground first.

all you need is a few billion cats and a few billion pieces of buttered toast and set up a few billion interconnected tables to push them off of at the same time to develop a new series of roadways. then you could lay vehicles, busses, ships, cargo, anything on top of them so that transportation could be seamless and quiet, and non pollutant

the only problem is because the motion is perpetual eventually the cats and buttered toast would go so fast the toast would disintegrate and the cats would explode due to centrifugal force. find a sollution to this problem and you have a clean source of energy!!!