freezing is the new global warming

[Paul G]

Europe has had the coldest winter in a decade. now all you GW proponents I cant wait to hear how freezin' is proof of warmin'

[ 12-31-2005, 04:40 AM: Message edited by: Paul G ]

[Chris Coose]

Portland received more precipitation this year than ever recorded.
Should I prepare the 300 cubit boat based on that information?

[rbgarr]

Europe has had the coldest winter in a decade. Winter is only ten days old so I'm not sure how this claim can be accurately made. I think the concept of 'climate change' is more useful than 'global warming' anyway, but what do I know. :D

[Hwyl]

In Britain the Winter solstice is considered "Midwinter". I think that both the Brit's and the US are wrong. Midwinter for me is SuperBowl Sunday.

I have never understood why winter her is considered to start on the Solstice.

This is thread drift. he climate models as to how my old friend the Gulf Stream has slowed down are pretty obvious to all those who don't have their heads firmly in the sand.

[Fitz]

We are somewhat overdue for another ice age.

Good time to buy stock in snow shovels.

[N. Scheuer]

Have you heard about the shrinking Artic and Antartic Icecaps, or the melting Permafronst, Paul?

Moby Nick

[Art Read]

Climate varies. Always has, always will. Get over it... Or freeze to death... Whichever suites your own personal temperment.

[Art Read]

Remember when society, as we know it, was going to come to a grinding, screeching halt on midnight five years ago? Still got your hoarded canned goods and flashlight batteries? ;)

Now that the computers still work, elevators still run and airplanes still fly, all that's left to worry about is how soon the oceans are going to boil away and leave us all in drought, or the icecaps melt and flood us all out, or the gulf stream stop and freeze Europe, or the mother of all El Ninos start and dry up the dust bowl again...

And guess what the solution is? Blame America and make us pay for it! BEFOREHAND! Priceless...

[ 12-31-2005, 11:10 AM: Message edited by: Art Read ]

[Hwyl]

Been in the stream lately Art?

[Art Read]

Yup. Still flowing North and East last I checked. And still warm. Exactly like it was when Ben Franklin first described it... (It does fluctuate you know. That's what made the Newport race so interesting in the days before GPS... And why what's her name still makes her living "predicting it" online for passagemakers now.) Amazing how you can sail with ice on your decks from an arctic coldfront off the coast and six hours later be sitting in shirtsleeves with the "Bermuda High" at your back...

First "Google" hit on Gulf stream/global warming...

"...One baffling aspect of global warming. Temperature records - mainly from the northern hemisphere ‚ show that the present phase of global warming actually began in the 1880s, before the man-made greenhouse effect got going. It accelerated in the 1970s, when greenhouse gases started to fill the atmosphere. So what we are seeing now ‚ in the northern hemisphere, anyway - could be a combination of the recent man-made greenhouse effect with a longer-term natural warming trend, powered by changes in the ocean currents..."

[ 12-31-2005, 11:44 AM: Message edited by: Art Read ]

[Ian McColgin]

Actually, the models of global warming all predict more exreem seasonal variations. Colder winters are a predicted consequence of global warming.

The interesting cataclysm will be if the ice packs melt so much that the termperature and nutrient transfers of the Gulf Stream and Labrador Current, etc. collapse.

[Art Read]

"...But in the region around Antarctica, the situation is by no means as clear-cut. Here, Broecker's analysis means that man-made warming is fighting against a natural cooling trend - and nobody knows what the consequences of that might be..."

'Nuff said.

[Art Read]

Who was it that wrote about that little old lady, standing in the surf with her broom, trying to sweep back a rising tide? ;)

[Hwyl]

You are comparing yourself to that little old lady, sweeping back the tide of data?

[Art Read]

No... I'm just cognisant of the fact that global climate is a force that neither I, nor my elected officials can do jack **** about.

[Art Read]

By the way, why should I be impressed with your "expert" data? Despite all the then current "expert" opinion to the contrary, our cities are not now buried under tons and tons of horse manure, communism has not spread over the world like an unstoppable "red tide", we have not filled every last inch of the planet with a starving mass of desperate humanity, fresh unpolluted water is not a worldwide "scarcity", coffee hasn't given me cancer and my cell phones didn't give me a brain tumor. And now, you and your "experts" presume to predict the weather! LOL!

(I really liked the "red wine is good for you" thing though...)

Read "The Limits to Growth" lately? Update: It didn't happen. Give me a few tenured PhDs, a budget and some numbers to crunch and they can extrapolate anything you want them to. Reality, pesky thing that is, tends to work differently.

The most telling thing I've ever read about this issue was a quote from a "scientist" who opined, "Even if these conclusions are wrong, our suggested solutions would still be a net gain for the environment. Therefore, they should be enacted regardless." I suspect he's probably right about the "net gain" thing. But, in my opinion, he's in the wrong business. "Lobbiests enter through the left door..."

[ 12-31-2005, 01:09 PM: Message edited by: Art Read ]

[Hwyl]

Originally posted by Art Read:
Despite all the then current "expert" opinion to the contrary, our cities are not now buried under tons and tons of horse manure,

The streets may not be filling up with horse manure but this thread is.

[ljb5]

Originally posted by Art Read:
By the way, why should I be impressed with your "expert" data?Art, I didn't realize you were so skeptical of 'expert' opinion about 'imminent threats.' How do you decide which 'expert' opinion you can dismiss with a scoff --- and which justifies starting a pre-emptive war?

I like your analogy about the Y2k bug. Why didn't we have problems with it? Because smart people figured it out, came up with a solution and implemented it. Companies spent billions of dollars upgrading their computers and re-writing their software to prevent any problems. I have several friends who made a nice living updating databases for large companies.

The result? No problems.

The ease of the Y2k transition is not an argument for ignoring expert advice --- it's a perfect example of how to implement a solution to a problem.

<hr>
You're right; there is some confusion about global warming. No one knows exactly what is happening or what will happen.

If you wrap yourself in salami and climb into a lion's cage, I don't know exactly what will happen to you ---- but I know enough to advise against it.

[Art Read]

"Smart" people invented computers in the first place. We didn't "invent" the global climate cycle however. I had every faith that the computer folk would figure out how to deal with a simple year change. (I actually rewrote a bit of 2 digit COBAL code myself, once upon a time...) I have less faith that politically charged technocrats in Kyoto have figured out the weather.

As for our intrepid computer geeks saving the world from Y2K, It still didn't stop an awful lot of "experts" from getting lots of airtime crying that the "sky was falling". Right up 'till New Year's Eve that year. Where were the "smart" people who knew the problem was already fixed? Nobody wanted to hear from them I guess.

[ 12-31-2005, 01:52 PM: Message edited by: Art Read ]

[Art Read]

(Good comeback Hwyl... "If not my way, it's the Hwyl!" ;) )

[Art Read]

"How do you decide which 'expert' opinion you can dismiss with a scoff --- and which justifies starting a pre-emptive war?"

That's a subject for another thread. Nice attempted segway though...

[Hwyl]

I didn't forsee my name being perceives as Highway 1, you're in good company, Lefty and Meerkat thought the same.

Hwyl is a Welsh word, it's pronounced almost exactly like "who will". It means "sail" (verb) and "fun" (noun). I thought it would be a good log on name. I was wrong.

Google search on "hwyl" (http://www.google.com/search?sourceid=navclient&ie=UTF-8&rls=GGLC,GGLC:1969-53,GGLC:en&q=hwyl)

[Art Read]

It was just a pun! Bad, I know... Like most I manage to come up with!

[rbgarr]

and which justifies starting a pre-emptive war? That reminds me of a joke I just heard: Every poker player in the world wants to sit in at the table when George Bush plays.

Every time he goes "All In" he's got nothing.

[Cuyahoga Chuck]

Humans are very adaptible and will roll with the punches. They will move upground if the sea rises. And they find ways to tolerate warmer or colder climates.
But other living things are not so adaptible. We are very vuneralble because the foodstuffs we depend on are a tiny segment of the edible plant world and many/most are hybrids that were developed to accomodate the conditions of certain agricultural landscapes.
The most vunerable populations are those that live on a rice based diet. They are so numerous that huge numbers of people would be endangered if rice crops succumbed to climate change.
Then there is the extremely important evaluation of how certain native boatbuilding lumbers would cope with climate/temperature change. The god's are not with us on this one. Northern hardwood forests are already being challenged by a new commer, the Red Maple. Red maple is an extremely competative swamp tree that can tolerate the wet and the dry equally. It can also tolerate low light levels that would kill most of the northern understory trees and bushes.
And, of course, there is the purple ash beetle which is not a climatological force but kills a lot trees nonetheless.
Not to worry. Our ancestors long, long ago got by on a hunter-gatherer lifestyle. There's a lot of protien in wood maggots.

Charlie

[ 12-31-2005, 01:57 PM: Message edited by: Cuyahoga Chuck ]

[Art Read]

So... The weather is gonna change is it, Charlie? News flash... It always has and always will. And you're gonna stop it how? Signing a treaty?

[Wild Dingo]

Well... Im damned sure its changin down here!!

Bloody well here it is summer... SUMMER!!! and Im rugged up like a freekin eskimo!! :mad:

Last year nice and hot 30 35 and a couple of nice warm 40s over Chrissy New Years this year it was bloody raining 2 days ago!! and been tryin every other day when its not

The "experts" reckon its the coldest December in West Aussie since 1922 or there abouts and I for one beleive them!

What to do about it? wear warm clothes!! :D Mind you when summer does finally find its way down here I reckon its gonna be a bloody ripper!! ooooooohhh come on summer!! :cool:

oooh and blame Bush Howard and Blair! tongue.gif

[ 12-31-2005, 02:13 PM: Message edited by: Wild Dingo ]

[ljb5]

Originally posted by Art Read:
"Smart" people invented computers in the first place. We didn't "invent" the global climate cycle however.We didn't invent Small Pox either, but we figured out how to deal with that.


I have less faith that politically charged technocrats in Kyoto have figured out the weather.And I'm supposed to have faith that politically charged plutocrats in Washington have?


As for our intrepid computer geeks saving the world from Y2K, It still didn't stop an awful lot of "experts" from getting lots of airtime crying that the "sky was falling". Right up 'till New Year's Eve that year.The only fools I remember predicting disaster were Pat Robertson, Jerry Falwell and that idiot conservative in Montana who turned himself blue by drinking colloidal silver to fend off infection. What a bunch of idiots!

Those of us who understood the problem and worked to solve it knew it wasn't going to be a disaster.

Yet one more reason to ignore the uninformed conservative idiots and listen to the people who actually deal with the problem.

Are you people ever right about anything?

[Art Read]

Button up, Shane! We're having a bit of a nasty weather ourselves. I blame the the county commissioner...

[Art Read]

Actually, Jb, my Brother-in-law is a vice president for Government Relations at EDS. My sister came home from a company Christmas party just before Y2K feeling VERY unsettled by what she'd heard from people there who should have known better. She, and my brother-in-law are about as close as you can get to the Democratic party. (He used to be deputy chairman under Chuck what's his name? Mannant?...)

It wasn't all right-wing, tele-evangelising, Armageddon spouting wackos who claimed that the end was near.

But keep telling yourself that if it makes you feel better.

[ 01-01-2006, 02:19 AM: Message edited by: Art Read ]

[Peter Malcolm Jardine]

I had every faith that the computer folk would figure out how to deal with a simple year change. This demonstrates a complete ignorance of the Y2K phenomenon.

[Peter Malcolm Jardine]

now all you GW proponents I cant wait to hear how freezin' is proof of warmin' More ignorance. Congrats.

[Rick Tyler]

Originally posted by Art Read:
Nice attempted segway though...I vote for this as the funniest spleling error of the day.

(A "seque" is a transition, a "Segway" is a strange personal transportation device.)

(AboutSpelllingErrors: We all do it. It's no big deel. It's only noteworthy when the mipselling adds value.)

[Art Read]

"We didn't invent Small Pox either, but we figured out how to deal with that."

Yeah. 'Cause we INVENTED vaccines.

Got your handy dandy global climate changing, human nature shifting, mother nature altering gizmo ready for market yet?

[ssor]

Some of the changes that I have noticed are:

The robins over wintering in Maryland

The Magnolias blossom about a week earlier than twenty years ago.

Summers seem to be hotter and drier and the winters seem to be wetter.

The ponds don't freeze hard enough to allow ice skating.

The woodchucks are active on some days during the winter.

Is this global warming ? I don't know. But it is different.

[Art Read]

"I vote for this as the funniest spleling error of the day."

Blame my "google" spell checker... ;)

[Art Read]

Peter? What phenomenon? Nothing happened. Remember?

[Art Read]

(AboutSpelllingErrors: We all do it. It's no big deel. It's only noteworthy when the mipselling adds value.)
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

So... Did you really mean to spell "spleling" like that? :D

(or "deel"?)

[ 12-31-2005, 02:45 PM: Message edited by: Art Read ]

[Hwyl]

Originally posted by Rick Tyler:
</font><blockquote>quote:</font><hr />Originally posted by Art Read:
Nice attempted segway though...I vote for this as the funniest spleling error of the day.

(A "seque" is a transition, a "Segway" is a strange personal transportation device.)

(AboutSpelllingErrors: We all do it. It's no big deel. It's only noteworthy when the mipselling adds value.)</font>[/QUOTE]I hate to be Donn, but it's actually spelled "segue"

[Peter Malcolm Jardine]

Peter? What phenomenon? Nothing happened. Remember? The "disaster" as it was spelled out, was real. The solution was very difficult, and very expensive. There were two levels of Y2K. One was imbedded systems, one was software. The real concern by corporations, particularly the banking system andthe transportation sector, was carefully downplayed to avoid consumer panic. The concern was well deserved.

[Art Read]

Segways are COOL! ;)

[ssor]

Quote: but it's actually spelled "segue"

and it is Philippine for hurry.

[ 12-31-2005, 02:56 PM: Message edited by: ssor ]

[Rick Tyler]

Originally posted by Hwyl:
</font><blockquote>quote:</font><hr />Originally posted by Rick Tyler:
(A "seque" is a transition, a "Segway" is a strange personal transportation device.)
I hate to be Donn, but it's actually spelled "segue"</font>[/QUOTE]I swear there is a demon on the Internet that does these things. Of course I mipselled "spell" and "deal" on purpose, but I swear that I typed "segue" correctly. Nearly every spelling correction post contains a mispelling -- I blame Cisco routers for introducing these.

[ 12-31-2005, 02:55 PM: Message edited by: Rick Tyler ]

[Art Read]

Lots of "imbedded hardware" situations in the used car business is there, Peter?

[ 12-31-2005, 02:55 PM: Message edited by: Art Read ]

[Art Read]

RIGHT WING Cisco routers you mean...

[Rick Tyler]

Originally posted by ssor:
and it is Philippine for hurry.Those crazy Filipinos! In the radio biz we used it to to describe a smooth transition between songs and other program material. It can also be used to describe any smooth transition ("the Northern sunset segued into purple night").

[ssor]

Originally posted by Rick Tyler:
</font><blockquote>quote:</font><hr />Originally posted by ssor:
and it is Philippine for hurry.Those crazy Filipinos! In the radio biz we used it to to describe a smooth transition between songs and other program material. It can also be used to describe any smooth transition ("the Northern sunset segued into purple night").</font>[/QUOTE]Forty-five yeats ago you would hear filipino mothers telling their children "segue, segue" when they were getting on the bus.

[Art Read]

"The concern was well deserved.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Would that be like the "concern" over terrorist activities within our borders? (Sorry, couldn't resist)

[Meerkat]

Originally posted by Art Read:
Lots of "imbedded hardware" situations in the used car business is there, Peter?More than in the boat business... ;)

[Peter Malcolm Jardine]

Lots of "imbedded hardware" situations in the used car business is there, Peter? Do you have time and interest in hearing about the problems Art? If so, I could outline some of major issues for you. I have probably more practical knowledge of Y2K problems and solutions than most people. I could tell you why that is in our further discussions. Nonetheless, your statement about Y2K being some kind of irrational hysteria is false.

[Donn]

Originally posted by Hwyl:
I hate to be Donn, but it's actually spelled "segue":D I rather enjoy it.

[Art Read]

"Nonetheless, your statement about Y2K being some kind of irrational hysteria is false."

I've never maintained that the Y2K situation wasn't a serious issue. I STILL maintain it was a tempting, "sexy" issue to be exploited by the media and corrupted into a false, catch-all "boogyman". One that was readily grasped by those in need of one. You disagree?

[ 12-31-2005, 03:08 PM: Message edited by: Art Read ]

[Cuyahoga Chuck]

Art,
Whether or not Kyoto amounts to a hill of beans it doesn't hurt to have somebody besides the local ward healers making evaluations about the possibility of climate change.
Like I said, something like 80% of the world's population lives on rice. No rice? Well there's always the land of milk and honey where burgers are on every corner. If enough third world types get hungry enough there could be enough tramp frieghters headed for West Coast of the US to make the Normandy invasion look like an Opti pram get-together. And whose to say that we will have enough for ourselves?
Politics is too heavily loaded with "right now" agendas and we can see from our current government what troubles ensue from not looking ahead.
Last night on "Now" there was an expose' on how the the coal and oil industries, along with some who are dependent on them, spend huge dollars just trying to muddy up any campaign to investigate global warming. There is even a guy in congress who spends all his available podium time making fun of global warming. 'Comes from Oklahoma, of course.
If the folks who claim the jury is still out are wrong our decendents could be in for a big shock. America won't be America if most of it's citizens are living a subsistance lifestyle.

Charlie

[ 12-31-2005, 03:31 PM: Message edited by: Cuyahoga Chuck ]

[Meerkat]

No need to blame global warming for americans endiung up "subsistance" living - "free trade" and outshoring is well on the way to doing that.

subsistence ;)

[Cuyahoga Chuck]

I'm worried enough and you had to bring up THAT. We should have an ironclad policy of only one armageddon per thread. Where's the Malox?

Charlie

[Art Read]

"If the folks who claim the jury is still out are wrong our descendents could be in for a big shock. America won't be America if most of it's citizens are living a subsistence lifestyle."

And if those on the other side who feel confident that their conclusions are correct were suddenly given the power to dictate a reaction upon the rest of us to "solve" the problem, it would be...?

(Please avoid gratuitous, "feel good" programs that would simply punish us dirty, greedy, selfish American bastards for our past, present and future behaivor.)

[Meerkat]

Oh let's see....

Mandate CAFE standards to 45mpg over 5 years, including light utlity (pickup) trucks.

Reinstate the power plant/industrial pollution reduction regulations introduced by the Clinton administration and rolled back by the Bush adminuistration.

[ 12-31-2005, 03:37 PM: Message edited by: Meerkat ]

[Cuyahoga Chuck]

You feel that an intelligent look at the future is "punishment"?
There is nothing in any scientific investigation that demands a solution. For starters, the evidence is sifted by competant minds. If there is a parallel political discussion fine and dandy. And if the media plays it up this way and that so what? The efficasy of the investigation is whatever it is. The prudent and the imprudent can look at what results and go whatever way they wish.
But America cannot stay America if the prevailing philosophy is "Ignorance is Wisdom". We've been involved in that train of thought for five years now and it sure has been a bummer.
The reason that I'm personally attracted to this topic is that there are very many wealthy and powerful people who are also attracted to it. They are the folks whose ox will be gored if environmental conditions demand that the laws be strengthened. Comes the time when they treat global warming as just a re-hash of the hoola-hoop craze then I will too.

Charlie

[ 12-31-2005, 04:14 PM: Message edited by: Cuyahoga Chuck ]

[Art Read]

Define "intellegent" Define "punishment"

[Cuyahoga Chuck]

I ain't your dictionary.
If you need implements to debate you'll have to supply them yourself.

Charlie

"kaaaaa-ching".

[Art Read]

Your words, not mine. Easy to insert in a sentence to add weight. I have yet to read anything "intelligent" about the political agenda to control weather and even less about how to "punish" those of us who don't buy into it.

[Meerkat]

Originally posted by Art Read:
Define "intellegent" Define "punishment"Define "Intelligent Design!" :D :D :D

[PeterSibley]

I heard a talk n the radio about climate change/global warming .The speaker was explaining tht the excess carbon numbers from before 1850 that had been giving all the number crunchers headaches came from carbon released from newly cleared and cultivated soils.There is a enormous amount of carbon tied up in undisturbed forest or prairy.Cultivation releases it.So does increases in temperature .

[rbgarr]

Rick wrote:
I swear that I typed "segue" correctly. Don't worry Rick. Most people who write about Seguin Island at the mouth of the Kennebec River spell it with a 'q' instead of a 'g' also... as Sequin Island.

[ljb5]

Originally posted by Art Read:
"We didn't invent Small Pox either, but we figured out how to deal with that."

Yeah. 'Cause we INVENTED vaccines.

Got your handy dandy global climate changing, human nature shifting, mother nature altering gizmo ready for market yet?I don't understand how you sub-divide problems into those which we will address and those which we will not.

The Y2k bug was a problem. Some people came up with a solution and the problem was fixed.

Small Pox was a problem; some people came up with a vaccine and the problem was solved.

It doesn't matter if you 'invented' the problem or if it occurred naturally. You just solve it.

I don't create the weather, but if it's cold, I put a jacket on. If it snows, I shovel the driveway.

I don't just throw up my hands and say, "oh, dear me! I didn't create this problem, therefore I shouldn't fix it."

We've got a problem with global warming --- we need a solution.

It's the same as any other problem: You do what needs to be done.

Do I have a product ready for market? Absolutely. It's called 'responsibility' and 'education.' It's free -- help yourself.

Is there a vaccine for terrorism? No? Does that mean we shouldn't try to solve the problem?

[ 12-31-2005, 05:30 PM: Message edited by: ljb5 ]

[Alan D. Hyde]

You've done some good counter-punching in this thread, Art. :D :D :D

Alan

[Donn]

Art...just wait until the


"Liberal leaders, Reid, Pelozi and Dean" get involved. They're the idea men. They could fix the greenhouse gas problem in a flash! :D

[Hwyl]

Donn I hereby accuse you of introducing a red herring. Your "Liberal leaders" quote is apparently not from this thread.

[ 12-31-2005, 06:21 PM: Message edited by: Hwyl ]

[Hwyl]

Originally posted by Alan D. Hyde:
You've done some good counter-punching in this thread, Art. :D :D :D

AlanActually mostly punching himself. It would take a buffoon to deny that the climate has not changed (as you well know Alan).
Just today we have the coldest day in W Australia in 82 years, it's been unusually hot and dry in E Australia, the U.K. has had unusual cold and snow, yesterday we had hurricane Zeta, today there are major mudslides in California. You know; there welll may be a pattern here

Art introduced the concept of "punishment" and then argued against it. A great self sustaining ploy but an argument he can never win.

[Donn]

Originally posted by Hwyl:
Donn I hereby accuse you of introducing a red herring. Your "Liberal leaders" quote is apparently not from this thread.Yeah, so? It's from another thread. Wot's yer point?

[PeterSibley]

I'm not quite sure I understand what passes for enviormental politics over there .How come Republican supporters have to deride the idea of Global Warming and any idea of it being human caused while the Dems are exactly the opposite.It doesn't quite make sense.

Our Australian Liberal.....(actually very conservative and Bush supporting government) has just come out and said Global Warming is one of the biggest problems humanity faces.

Here the argument is over how to institute change to emissions ..not if.

Is the US really so polarised that these positions are just frozen?

[High C]

Originally posted by Hwyl:
...It would take a buffoon to deny that the climate has not changed...It would take a buffoon to not know that the climate has always been changing.

[Hwyl]

Originally posted by Donn:
</font><blockquote>quote:</font><hr />Originally posted by Hwyl:
Donn I hereby accuse you of introducing a red herring. Your "Liberal leaders" quote is apparently not from this thread.Yeah, so? It's from another thread. Wot's yer point?</font>[/QUOTE]My point is that you are truly hoisted by your own petard...commodore ;)

[Rick Tyler]

Peter, it's a mystery.

If you want to duke it out over global warming, you need to divide the fight into several parts. It's not just one argument you are having, it is:

1. Is the globe's surface getting warmer?

2. The Earth has clearly been warming since the end of the last Ice Age (or perhaps, since the beginning of the current inter-glacial period), but from about 1350 to about 1850 the "Little Ice Age" reversed that trend. Since 1850, the warming has started again. Is the warming of the last 150 years "normal"?

3. Is the accelerated warming of the last 50 years normal?

4. If you grant that global temps are going up over the last 50 years, do manmade greenhouse gases have anything to do with it?

There are some interesting, I think, related questions:

5. Is the current warming trend irreversible, or is it like the "Population Bomb" that never happened? Will exogeneous factors change the balance of heating and cooling (like atmospheric aerosols)?

6. The price of photovoltaics has dropped to the level that their life cycle cost of energy is only 2-4 times higher than fossil-fired powerplants. What would it take for this technology to achieve parity? What would society powered by local photovoltaics look like? How would transportation, homes, and work life look? I think the solar electric revolution might really start to happen in the next ten years. The cost of manufacture of silicon solar cells dropped over 90% between 1976 and 1998.

7. Repeat after me -- hydrogen is a stupid power source. This didn't fit, but I really wanted to say it.

[PeterSibley]

Guess you guys are too busy attacking each other to answer :D

[Rick Tyler]

Peter, I did answer you. It's a mystery.

[Donn]

Mr. Sibley, sir, I don't think we (the right) think it's a political issue. We don't deny there's global warming. We question the assertion that it's Bush's fault. And, we question the assumption that something like Kyoto can solve it.

Our position is that merely weakening western economies will do nothing other than weaken western economies, and not necessarily solve the problem of global warming. In other words, it's just another way for anti-Bush, anti-US factions to attack Bush/US.

We also do not think that the problem is as dire as the anti-Bush/US faction plays it up to be. If it were, Earth would have self-combusted some time ago. It hasn't.

[PeterSibley]

Ahhh ,thanks Rick.I've got a really slow dialup and things happen gently smile.gif

Thanks for the answer...well put, but the question was to do with the rusted on opinions that seem to so closely reflect party loyalties .Here things are a lot more fluid.

[Cuyahoga Chuck]

God bless you Rick. You've done it! You got Donnnn to write a whole bunch of sentences in a row. Look at 'em! There must be 4 or 5.
Of course, they suggest an "after me the deluge" philosophy that those of us with offspring might find wanting but, in this case we shouldn't ask for too much.
And that stuff about, "it's all Bush's fault". I don't recall much of that. But, I for one, would put him in the "trees cause air pollution" school along with The Great Communicator.
And this "Bush/US" construction is something that hasn't yet gotten into US civics books. We could certainly use a bit of explaination as to how/why opponents of George Bush are somehow opponents of the United States. It's of particular importance because Bush has never gotten much more than about half the popular vote. Are those citizens who found Bush wanting unpatriotic, treasonous, villinous,(fill in the blank with your favorite perjorative)?

Charlie

"A fun filled thread if there ever was one".

[ 12-31-2005, 09:10 PM: Message edited by: Cuyahoga Chuck ]

[High C]

Originally posted by Cuyahoga Chuck:
...And that stuff about, "it's all Bush's fault". I don't recall much of that...Oh please... :rolleyes:

[formerlyknownasprince]

The interesting thing with GW will be the dramatic local changes. Its 105F here today at 11:30am - with the mercury heading north.

Yep - we've had high temps here over the years, but Sydney has just had its hottest December on record - with an average temp of 84F - against an average of 79F.

We took two cars north on Christmas Eve - my wife saw an ambient of 115F at one stage - I got to enjoy this in my son's car with the heater stuck on and no aircon - just loved driving for six hours with what felt like a hair drier stuck on its hottest setting blowing on my foot. :mad:

Ian

[ssor]

Donn, Please find a safe place to sit . OK, ready? I Agree with you, with some reservations. I don't believe that global warming is Bush's fault. I do believe that he is giving it short shrift. I don't believe that some of the measures that were rolled back would have been harmful to the economy and I do believe that they would have been beneficial to the environment. In the overall needs of the country and the environment we will benefit from measures that clean up the industrial waste whether it be air borne, waste water or solid and treat these products as resources instead of liabilities.

[ljb5]

Seriously, who ever said that Bush caused global warming? Not me.

What a pathetic red herring you've raised, Donn.

Bush is responsible for U.S. policy -- on that, I think we can agree.

While global warming may not be his fault, he's in a position to do something about it and he is responsible for his actions (or inaction.)

[ 12-31-2005, 07:46 PM: Message edited by: ljb5 ]

[John Bell]

Great questions, Rick. Pretty much the same ones I have about the situation.

Also, we've got a solution that would eliminate most fossil fuel fired electrical generation, but no one will consider it: nuclear power. And until the climate change folks open up their minds to the possibility that nukes have a place in supplying our energy needs, then they have no credibility with me.

[ssor]

I happen to agree with the late Shah of Iran Oil and coal are much too valuable to burn for fuel. The early colonial sugar Barons burned Carib Mahogany for fuel to boil sugar cane sap.

[Meerkat]

Originally posted by John Bell:

Also, we've got a solution that would eliminate most fossil fuel fired electrical generation, but no one will consider it: nuclear power. And until the climate change folks open up their minds to the possibility that nukes have a place in supplying our energy needs, then they have no credibility with me.Can we stick the waste in your backyard? ;)

Properly running fission reactors dump radioactive gases into the atmosphere. They have short half lives, but you don't want to live downwind! :eek:

What we need is fusion.

[ssor]

All corporate executives should be required to live down wind from their dirtiest production plants.

[Sea Frog]

Heatwave? What heatwave?

[Cuyahoga Chuck]

John,
One of the most succesful domestic nuclear programs is that of France. All the reactors of Electricite France (sic) are of one design. They have developed a way to get rid of their nuclear waste without great expence or great danger. The government of France mandated all this so that controls could be maintained.
In the US reactors are of many different designs and of many different qualities. The same goes for the operators. The NRA has never held a very tight grip on all the operators and dangerous happenings are legend. Our nuclear waste program is years behind. And the question of how and who pays to safeguard all these reactor sites when their lives are over has never been examined even by the most successful operators.

Charlie

[Meerkat]

Chuck; I don't know where you dug up that nonsense, but that's what it is. :rolleyes:

[BrianW]

I'd be more impressed with the Global Warming theorys, if the plan for dealing with it was not such a politcal money grabbing fiasco.

The Kyoto Accord want's countries like the US to buy 'pollution rights' from other non-developed countries.

That's not a plan for reducing pollution, it's just a plan to spread the wealth.

[High C]

Originally posted by BrianW:
I'd be more impressed with the Global Warming theorys, if the plan for dealing with it was not such a politcal money grabbing fiasco.

The Kyoto Accord want's countries like the US to buy 'pollution rights' from other non-developed countries.

That's not a plan for reducing pollution, it's just a plan to spread the wealth.Exactly, and though there are a number of elements to Kyoto and similar schemes that do indeed have environmental merit, as long as these agreements are such transparent money grabs, they're going to get the stiff arm from the US, no matter who's in the Whitehouse.

[ljb5]

The idea of linking monetary incentives to desired outcomes is an old and well-established concept --- they call it "CAPITALISM" -- perhaps you've heard of it?

[ljb5]

Originally posted by Art Read:
"We didn't invent Small Pox either, but we figured out how to deal with that."

Yeah. 'Cause we INVENTED vaccines.

Got your handy dandy global climate changing, human nature shifting, mother nature altering gizmo ready for market yet?Art, I've been puzzling over this for hours and I can't figure out what you meant.

Do you mean that we cannot or should not try to solve problems unless we can build and market a "handy dandy gizmo"?

Please explain.

[seafox]

early in this thread it was written that all the global warming models predict more extream weather.

Actually I belive that the most popular one predicted that most of the warming would take place in the winter with little effect on summer temps. ( I said little not none <G>) so while winter temps would be 4 degrees warmer by the yyear 2100 summer would only be about 1 degree warmer

I for one would welcome this change

if I may ask a couple of questions

life cycle costs of photo votaics= what limits the life of PV ? why do they wear out? I played around with the math once and found that at current cost and an estimated life of 50 years if you had built a "solar farm" and were paid the current ( I belive 2 cents per kwhour) third party producer rate and the utility sell to consumers for 8 cents per Kwh it would take 47,5 years to break even and in the end after 50 years you would get a 5% profet on invested money

second question if the global warming is having more effect in the higher lattitudes especally the north pole and it is causeing a weakening of the gulf stream and cooling europe first of all would this not be self correcting ie reversing the northern lattitudes warming and thus strengthing the ocean currents? and second ddoes the same thing happen in the pacific with the japaneese current? if the japanese current weakens does that meen alaska will be cooler? and if the return current down the west coast wqeaken down that meen surfing in the warm waters of oregon? also more moisture evaporating and carried inland?

and finaly one of the renewable energy ideas are gient underwater turbines to harness the energy of the gulf stream especally as it passed between florida and the bahamas.
question if they build those gulf stream turbines will that also weaken the stream and cool europe?
thankyou for your thoughts

[Cuyahoga Chuck]

Meer,
So nice of you to come for a tour.
On Lake Erie not far from the beloved Bass Islands, world capital of walleye fishing is the Davis-Besse Nuke plant.
A few years ago a rusty stain appeared on the inner containment vessle. Of course it was never reported to NRA. But somehow the NRA found out about and came to call. The rusty stain was, in fact, a very large hole that acid had eaten into the thick wall of the vessle. Eventually it was decided that the danger was palpable and repairs had to be initiated. Fortunately, an identical containment vessle was found and after spending hundreds of millions of dollars the plant is again on-line. Well, it's on line sometimes. But the sometime interludes are so infrequent that the reactor has no hope of paying the costs of maintaining and running it. It's a dog. And the folks that own it and run it are the same folks who initiated the greatest electrical blackout in the history of the world. They claimed it was caused by "trees". The electricity they generate is so expensive that Ohio municipalities have tried to band together to buy cheaper out of state juice.
And the thought of this reactor and dozens of others sitting on the shores of the Great Lakes when they are old and abandoned is not something that will bring pleasure to our decendents.
And I believe Davis-Besse and it's younger brother Perry are both storing their waste on site pending resolution of the way it will all be trucked to Nevada, if ever.

Charlie

[ 12-31-2005, 11:15 PM: Message edited by: Cuyahoga Chuck ]

[seafox]

LJB5
the buying of polution credits while it "might be a captialistic idea" I do not belive to be logical
on the one hand the countrys who were going to polute keep on poluting and the countrys with out the technology to polute get money to not do what they could not any way.

since keyoto used 1990 as the base line russa would be able to sell large numbers of credits because its economy in what 40% of its former self. america on the other hand were it to cut to 95 percent of the 1990 number would ineffect have to turn off 30 percent of its current economy. it would also have to curtail about 20% of its military training operations and active duty actions.

this is why it was called a transparrent money grab and a threat to western economys.

further when based on dollors of economic activity the relitively more efficent american economy would be gutted while the relitively dirty and growing economys of comunist china and india are unlimited by the treaty
jeff

[ljb5]

Seafox,

Kyoto isn't perfect -- no treaty ever is.

But it's a step in the right direction.

If Bush was interested in preventing global warming, he could have tried to modify Kyoto, or scrap it and start new talks, or come up with an alternative or done a million other things to improve the situation.

He has done nothing. Worse than nothing, he's actually denied the problem and inhibited any solution.

There are two separate issues here: First, is global warming a problem? Second, is Kyoto the solution?

Even if Kyoto is not the solution, it does not change the answer to question number one. If the answer to question one is 'yes,' then we need a solution. Maybe not Kyoto -- but we need a solution and Bush is not offering, or even considering anything.

[ 12-31-2005, 09:13 PM: Message edited by: ljb5 ]

[seafox]

Hey Charlie
Is those ohio nuke plants part of the shell company that wants to "temporarly" park 40,000 tons of used fuil rods one hour upwind of utahs 2 milion people on the gosute indian reservation? lovely site right under the flight path of thousands of military sortes to the utah test and training range right next door where they drop live amunition.
( remember was it in new jersey where somehow an F-16 on a night training flight let go with its 20 mm gattling gun? only it was 2 miles off course and shot up an elementry school littlerly scaring the S*** out of the janitor)
good old patraotic Utah where when the goverment says "trust us, were here to help you" we remember thousands of dead sheep from nerve gas and thousands of dead and dying family members from above ground nuke tests, that were put on hold if the wind was blowing toward vegas or california but hey if the wind was east or north why fire that bomb.
I wonder if the cost of one american Nuke plant with all the political fighting and court battles were put into producing solar electric cells if it would not end up producing more electricty and also jump starting an industry. and how many nuke plants would it take to replace just the oilfired electric plants and howmany to replace the gas fire plants and then how many to replace the coal plants?

How many years of nuke fuil do we have?
you know me I'm as conservite as they come but honestly here do you want to dismantal a nuke plant when its wornout or replace the solar cells when they wear out? and what do you do with the ground the nuke plant sets on after it wears out? build another nuke plant? but uranium supply is limited I belive to about 70 years worth right? what then?

fusion do you think they will get it to work? what will it take to get it working steady and producing more power than it uses to kindal the flame?

[seafox]

LJB5
for discussion sake lets say that global warming is a problem ie that it is actually happening and that it is detrimental to america. and serious question here are non americans "worth" the same as americans. by this I mean if their was a solution that would save the world but leave america in the stone age would you do it?

okgiven the above assumptions and the prediction that in the next 50 or 100 years the temp will rize one degree celcious with out kyoto and 7/10 of a degree with kyoto if every one does what the treaty said. is 3/10s of a degree worth it?

[ljb5]

Originally posted by seafox:
LJB5
for discussion sake lets say that global warming is a problem ie that it is actually happening and that it is detrimental to america. and serious question here are non americans "worth" the same as americans. by this I mean if their was a solution that would save the world but leave america in the stone age would you do it?

okgiven the above assumptions and the prediction that in the next 50 or 100 years the temp will rize one degree celcious with out kyoto and 7/10 of a degree with kyoto if every one does what the treaty said. is 3/10s of a degree worth it?Let's not be silly. Don't pretend that Exxon-Mobil making a little less profit is the sames as us reverting to the stone age!

What about the possibility that U.S. companies might adapt, innovate and come up with creative, profitable solutions to the new challenges?

Surely you haven't written off the value of U.S. innovation, have you? Do you really have such a low opinion of the U.S.?

I'm not concerned about global warming because I want the U.S. to suffer. I'm concerned about it because I fear that's where we are headed. As we all know, course corrections are most effective, easiest and cheapest when made early.

Is 3/10 of a degree worth it? Perhaps not -- but it's a step in the right direction, which is always better than a step in the wrong direction. If 3/10 of a degree is not enough, we'll do something else -- and after that something else -- and again and again until the problem is solved.

That's how you fix problems. You do what needs to be done to fix the problem -- you don't just throw your hands up and say, "I'm too greedy, too stupid, too lazy or too unmotivated to do it."

I've never heard such a bunch of whining from conservatives. Whaa, wha, wha! It's too hard! I can't thing of any good solutions! It's too expensive! I'm not even going to try!

These people would gladly spend $400 billion in a futile attempt to spread democracy -- yet they can't raise a finger to improve the entire planet.

[ 12-31-2005, 09:57 PM: Message edited by: ljb5 ]

[seafox]

going back to an earlyer post to meet the kyoto guidelines the US would have to cut its economy 30% and also cut military activities by a 5th all of that for3/10s of a degree and then only if every other country in the world also cut their economy

and when you say its a step in the right direction and if it doesn't solve the problem then take amother and another till it is solved.

but are you not asuming that all of the warming is man caused?
are you not also advocating turning off more and more of the economy.
yes their are a lot of inovations possable and I do belive in americas ability to come up with some, but if they were economically viable they would already be being developed, your sugestion is to make the current way of life so expensive that it artifically creates viability in other options.

in national geographic a letter to the editor on the end of oil complained that the electric future envisioned with every one driving personal electric vehicles was just as bad as a fossil fuil future and asked where is the efficent mass transit.

EFFICIENT MASS TRANSET? mayby energy efficent but hardly efficent in terms of human captial every week day moring I see the people lined up waiting for busses down at the mall, how many man hours are wasted that way? how far do those people have to walk after they get off the bus . last time I took a bus it was from droping off my car at a repair shop when the bus got to a stop a 1/4 mile from my home I thought it would go left right by it and I could get a closer stop I was wrong and insteed got a Half mile walk made me 15 minutes late for work and cost me 2 dollers and a ticked off boss

but what do you think of solar cells insteed of nuke plants

what do you think of turning waste into synthetic oil insteed of stripmining oil shale?

[ljb5]

Originally posted by seafox:
but are you not asuming that all of the warming is man caused?We didn't cause small pox -- but we fixed it. It doesn't matter if we caused global warming -- we will suffer from it, therefore it is in our interests to do whatever we can not to suffer.


are you not also advocating turning off more and more of the economy.Not at all. Maybe reshaping it a little; making it more efficient and more responsible -- but not shutting it off. Perhaps even growing it by creating new areas of research, new markets, new products and new ideas.

If we cure all disease, will you complain that it puts doctors out of work?

When slavery was abolished a lot of people made the argument that the economy could not survive without it. Possibly true -- but wholly irrelevant.


if they were economically viable they would already be being developed, your sugestion is to make the current way of life so expensive that it artifically creates viability in other options.You have that backwards. Efficiency is always economically advantageous. Waste is never the better option. There is an artificial force on the market -- but it's promoting waste and decreasing the motive for efficiency (that's why Exxon-Mobil is making so much money and so many people are driving around in massive SUVs.)


every week day moring I see the people lined up waiting for busses down at the mall, how many man hours are wasted that way? Ever been stuck in a traffic jam? Ever spent twenty minutes looking for a parking space?

[huisjen]

Originally posted by Ironmule:
PS, should I dig up the links to the eight other GW threads? ;) It'll probably be more effective if you just cut and paste the whole eight threads into this one.

Dan

[Cuyahoga Chuck]

Jeff. You are right. It was a boondoggle. But Louisiana was and is a poor southern state. So anything that brought federal money was a go even if it was based on bad science and jerkwater engineering. Now Louisiana and the other states bordering the Mississippi will get more money to undo the bad stuff that the original money brought about.
The bad stuff that was done to the Mississippi only effects those that live near the river and it's possible to reverse the prior mistakes given the time and the money.
With global climate change any missteps could endanger not millions of people but billions. And there is an unknown. If we go beyond some dangerous weather frontier can we revert to the acceptible side? Nobody knows.
Some other things that are unknown:
What will happen to the climate of western Europe if the Gulf Stream shuts down?
What will happen to the western US if the snow pack that fills their reservoirs declines?
What will happen to the southern states if the northern states get hotter and there is a tussle for power to run air conditioners?
What will happen if climate change causes a shortfall in the production of primary foodstuffs?
None of this stuff is known.
Even if these events were only part of a minor weather cycle (30 years or less)they would cause one hell of a lot of suffering.

Charlie

[Art Read]

Charlie... see a professional.

[Art Read]

(No idea why this wound up here...)

[ 01-01-2006, 01:38 AM: Message edited by: Art Read ]

[Art Read]

Jb said...

"Do you mean that we cannot or should not try to solve problems unless we can build and market a "handy dandy gizmo"?

Please explain..."

I say, "How else"? ;)

[ljb5]

Originally posted by Art Read:
I say, "How else"? ;) Diplomacy, negotiation, cooperation, education, responsibility....

Is there a "handy-dandy" gizmo to fight terrorism that is ready for market?

Is there one to teach abstinence, or promote family values or discourage homosexuality or prevent abortion, or decrease drug use?

Did we defeat the Nazis and overcome communism with a 'handy dandy gizmo'?

Where did you get the idea that nothing can be done except through sales and marketing of a material object?

If you must ask, "How else?" you are truly one of God's most ignorant and least imaginative creations.

[ 01-01-2006, 02:42 AM: Message edited by: ljb5 ]

[Art Read]

[ 01-01-2006, 02:48 AM: Message edited by: Art Read ]

[Art Read]

"Art, I've been puzzling over this for hours and I can't figure out what you meant."

It ain't rocket science. Got a better answer than western civilisation?

[Art Read]

"Is there a "handy-dandy" gizmo to fight terrorism that is ready for market?"

Yup. I believe it comes in fifty caliber.

[ljb5]

What was it Ghandi said about Western civilization?

"Yes, that would be a good idea."

I'm a big fan of western civilization. The can-do attitude and fact-based approach has solved a lot of problems and created great advancements.

I can't figure out why you want to stop now and pretend like there are some problems we can't solve and shouldn't even try.

[ljb5]

Originally posted by Art Read:
"Is there a "handy-dandy" gizmo to fight terrorism that is ready for market?"

Yup. I believe it comes in fifty caliber.I've got one for global warming.

It's called a "bicycle."

You could also walk to work, take the bus, carpool, live closer to work, drive a smaller car, drive a more efficient car, live in a smaller, more efficient house....

It's not rocket science --- "Waste not, want not."

Waste is not a capitalist value. Efficiency is good business.

[ 01-01-2006, 02:49 AM: Message edited by: ljb5 ]

[Art Read]

"If you must ask, "How else?" you are truly one of God's most ignorant and least imaginative creations."

So, you don't have a car? or drive one on occasion? How do you heat your house? Does your workplace use electricity? Flushed a toilet lately? Hypocrite.

[ljb5]

Originally posted by Art Read:
So, you don't have a car? or drive one on occasion? How do you heat your house? Does your workplace use electricity? Flushed a toilet lately? Hypocrite.I have a car. It was the most efficient available to me when I bought it. I drive it very rarely. I usually walk to work or take the bus.

I heat my house with natural gas, and make sure it is well insulated.

I preach efficiency -- and I practice efficiency.

That is not hypocrisy.

Did I ever say we must be Luddites? Did I ever say we must revert to the stone age? Did I ever say there is no responsible way to use a car?

I never said such a thing. I said we need to be more efficient -- and I practice that.

[ 01-01-2006, 03:01 AM: Message edited by: ljb5 ]

[Art Read]

"I can't figure out why you want to stop now and pretend like there are some problems we can't solve and shouldn't even try."

I never said we shouldn't try. In fact, I believe that we, as a political entity will always continue trying... long after most cynics have decided that we no longer are. And there's no guarantee that either of us will ever like the "decisions". Political beliefs are transitory and hypocrisy is where one finds it. Think what you may.

Doesn't mean I think politicians will ever likely stumble on, and support, the best possible answers!

[ 01-01-2006, 03:33 AM: Message edited by: Art Read ]

[Art Read]

P.S. Well said, Jeff!

[Art Read]

Jb wrote...

"We've got a problem with global warming --- we need a solution"

We've also got a problem with crime, terrorism and rogue nuclear states. Problems that can be addressed without rolling back two centuries of industrial advance. But you don't go there do you?

(Sorry, I guess that's a subject for another thread, too...)

[ 01-01-2006, 06:01 AM: Message edited by: Art Read ]

[ljb5]

Originally posted by Art Read:
P.S. Well said, Jeff!Yes, Jeff is right --- the solution to global warming will be complex, difficult to find and hard to implement.

Does that mean we shouldn't look for a solution --- or we should look very, very hard?

In the real world, we deal with issues like complexity, trade-offs, sacrafice and compromise.

We do not pretend that all problems have simple, easy solutions with no drawbacks (like invading Iraq.)

We recognize difficulty, deal with it -- and get the job done.

[Peter Malcolm Jardine]

If you want to duke it out over global warming, you need to divide the fight into several parts. It's not just one argument you are having, it is: There is no argument over global warming. There are, quite simply, two groups of people: those who are aware and informed on the science, and those who are not. NEXT

As for Kyoto, the american semantic argument is that Kyoto is flawed. The reality is that America has not proposed any other solution, and indeed, the present administration hasn't any interest in proposing a solution. After all, George Bush is at war. Nothing else matters. :rolleyes:

[Meerkat]

3/10th of a degree would be worth it if it prevented all the frozen methane at the bottom of the polar oceans from melting (turn gaseous).

[Paul G]

There is no argument over global warming. There are, quite simply, two groups of people: those who are aware and informed on the science, and those who are not. NEXT Peter sounds your world is populated by black hats and white hats, youre either with us or against us blah blah blah...

The science of GW is not proven, agreed there is plenty of anecdotal evidence of unusual weather patterns and rising of falling local temperatures. No one is certain of the reasons why, whether these are part of a long term pattern or too many cow farts. Its really amusing to see people saying how colder weather is proof of how its all heating up! We have advancing glaciers down here in NZ, why? Well one reason is that there is more snow, i.e. colder weather. The Antartic ice shelf is actually getting thicker.

I like this opinion, why? because GW hysteria is mostly academic opinion based on very flimsy science.


Satellite data gives more of a global picture. 75% of the earth is covered by oceans. Of the rest, nearly 3% is covered by ice and of the remaining 24% less than 2% is habitable, when you take out swamps, deserts, lakes, ranges etc. In fact we live only on 1.4% of the surface of the Earth, hardly representative of the planet. According to National Geographic, all of Earth's metropolitan areas would only fit into an area less than the size of Spain. It is only a human vanity to imagine that our relatively small inhabited percentage of global surface has the ability to alter the climate of the whole planet. If we only occupy 1.8%, that means 98.6% of Earth is uninhabited. Even if Bush and Blair are to blame, Ljb5 can ride his bike and drive a hybrid, but its going to make very little difference to the planet, in fact if the every citizen on the planet rode a bke and drove a hybrid we would all be worse off considering that most of us dont own cars, in fact last I heard more than half the world hadnt even made a phone call! So ljb5 the answer to you GW dilemma is to end western civilisation and head back to the cave so that nature can balance itself.

Natural balance is yet another myth that we all take for granted, there is no such thing. Nature is an unbelievably complex ongoing process that no one scientifically understands, our perspective is static and given that human nature is caught up in security and survival issues, we like to reduce everything to simplistic, understandably and static concepts. In nature everything changes constantly, it just it seems static so we project our desire to have things remain the same. Eventually one day we are going to be in an ice-age, and there is nothing Bush or Blair or the Pope can do about it, unstoppable, inevitable and sad but true.

For those that believe in GW the very best thing you can do for the planet is to eliminate your demands on it and find a very tall cliff and jump of it (btw lemmming suicides were just another disney myth)

[Paul G]

If you must ask, "How else?" you are truly one of God's most ignorant and least imaginative creations. dont you just love this beautiful, openminded and free thinking response to questioning the validity of GW

[Peter Malcolm Jardine]

Peter sounds your world is populated by black hats and white hats On the contrary, my world is rarely populated by absolutes of any kind. The global warming problem fundamentally asks a couple of very basic question: Is man and his pollutive technologies having an impact on global weather? Is this effect escalating and have a detrimental effect on global climate?

I don't have time for people who ignore the overwhelming scientific opinion, study, and consideration that says YES to these questions.

Your country has the right to choose not to do anything about it's pollutive nature. Just don't be self righteous about it, it makes you look stupid. ;)

[ 01-01-2006, 06:14 PM: Message edited by: Peter Malcolm Jardine ]

[ljb5]

Originally posted by Ironmule:
The conservative position is that "If we don't know what we're doing, First! do no harm."That makes a lot of sense, but it's not the conservative position.

The conservative position is, 'If you don't know what you're doing --- buy a larger SUV and burn more oil.'

I'll grant that much about global warming is confusing, perhaps even debatable.

Considering that, wouldn't the 'conservative' position be to act cautiously, learn more, and hedge your bets by reducing consumption?

Throwing caution to the wind, denying all evidence and demanding the largest, most wasteful SUVs doesn't seem 'conservative' at all -- it seems positively reckless.

Even if, hypothetically, global warming wasn't so well established, wouldn't it be more cautious, more conservative, to err on the side of caution and take some small, reasonable steps to reduce it?

[ 01-01-2006, 06:39 PM: Message edited by: ljb5 ]

[George Jung]

All sensible recommendations - but that's not what the left has been calling for; they want the Kyoto treaty ratified, which, from what I've seen simply penalizes the US economy, to the benefit of the 'developing' nations. I'm all for looking for ways to cut oil consumption, improve efficiency of use, and seek alternative energy sources. These gains can be had without paying out a 'penalty' to other nations.

And recognize that we can all do our part to economize, as already noted in this (and the other 8 GW threads); buy that more efficient vehicle; walk/ride bike when possible. Optimize home insulation.

The government can 'encourage' this direction, as well; legilative inducements; changes in the tax codes (it used to be there was a tax break if you DID drive an SUV; don't know if it's still in effect). Note this would be a bipartisan, or non-partisan, effort; no need to sling political mud over this one.

[ljb5]

Originally posted by George Jung:
Note this would be a bipartisan, or non-partisan, effort; no need to sling political mud over this one.In theory, it could be a non-partisan effort -- but have you noticed that one of the parties has developed a rather close relationship with the oil industry?

Whatever your complaints about the left on this issue (and I agree that Kyoto may not be the solution), you just articulated a position much, much, closer to the left than the right.

The right refuses to recognize the problem -- refuses even to err on the side of caution. They have no policy other than drill, burn, deny, ignore and attack.

[Rick Tyler]

Can I just add an aside here to congratulate ljb on the longest series of coherent, thoughtful, nearly-rant-free posts I've seen him make? I really appreciate it. Maybe he can offer lessons to Jardine?

This has been one of the most interesting threads in a long time, even if I haven't had the time to do the research to make meaningful contributions. (There goes life interfering with the Web again...)

[Paul G]

On the contrary, my world is rarely populated by absolutes of any kind. preceeded by


There is no argument over global warming. There are, quite simply, two groups of people: those who are aware and informed on the science, and those who are not. NEXT perhaps this is a rare moment for you Peter. I dont like big business and its inconsiderate treatment of the environment. I thnk we can agree that efficiency is bettter than wholesale gluttony of materialistic consumption. However you are going to have to come up with some evidence that your "modelling" of the environment has any actual relevance to real life.

Every idiot with a drum to bang has climbed on board GW because it serves some belief system. What is laughable is those bang on the loudest very rarely give up home comforts. Ok you might walk a bit more than drive, but if you really were convinced that cars and industry and cow farts were going to kill up all forever then surely a responsible man would throw a few "world is ending placards over his shoulder and head to downtown toronto or wherever to preach the good word or retreat to the cave with Ljb5 and the rest of responsible western civilisation.

The fact that you reply means you are using a computer, the whole industry is based on obsolesence and causes huge environmental harm and uses power to boot. So dont make me laugh by going on about how much you believe in GW. Sure you might entertain the idea, and it might appeal to your sensibilities but like most of the rest of the world your behaviour indicates you dont really take it seriously.

[George Jung]

Rick Tyler:

Can I just add an aside here to congratulate ljb on the longest series of coherent, thoughtful, nearly-rant-free posts I've seen him make? I really appreciate it. Maybe he can offer lessons to Jardine?

Couldn't agree more; just goes to show IT CAN BE DONE! :D

LJB5

In theory, it could be a non-partisan effort -- but have you noticed that one of the parties has developed a rather close relationship with the oil industry?

Whatever your complaints about the left on this issue (and I agree that Kyoto may not be the solution), you just articulated a position much, much, closer to the left than the right.
"Global Warming", whatever your views on it, has been around a LOT longer than the most recent Republican administration. What have any of it's predecessors, Dim or Rip, done about it?
And again - although you've previously pidgeonholed me as right, let me - again - point out I'm Independent; just right of center; but not on all issues...

[ljb5]

Originally posted by George Jung:
What have any of it's predecessors, Dim or Rip, done about it? Interesting question, but irrelevant. The only important question is, "What should we do now?"

But, since you asked....

Al Gore wrote a book about the subject, Earth in the Balance, creating a lot of interest and discussion of the subject.

Clinton negotiated and signed an international agreement that could help.

Jimmy Carter enacted strong legislation (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jimmy_Carter) to protect the environment, including protecting 103,000,000 acres of National park.

Not much, I admit --- but a billion times more than the Rips have done.

Mostly, the Rips deny that the problem exists, tell us to burn more oil, buy larger cars and open protected areas for mining, logging and drilling.

Dan Quayle blamed the problem on trees.

There is a difference between Democrats and Republicans on this issue.

[PeterSibley]

Maybe if GW were seen as defence national security issue.....woud the Pentagon take over ?

[ljb5]

Originally posted by Ironmule:
You'll notice he's ignored my Mississppi River analogy.I didn't ignore it. I recognized that solutions are sometimes difficult, nuanced and involve sacrifice, compromise and trade-offs -- yet that doesn't diminish the necessity of solving problems.

You're the one who is avoiding discussion. Earlier, I asked you some specific questions about what it means to be 'conservative' -- and you neglected to respond.


I don't know anyone with an SUV who isn't a liberal democrat:eek: :eek: :eek: :eek:

Jeff, do you expect anyone to take you seriously when you say stuff like this?

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/motoring/graphics/2005/08/03/hum1.2.jpg

Let me guess -- there are no conservatives working in the oil and gas industry either! Exxon-Mobil is saturated with leftists, Halliburton is staffed with commies, Enron was lead by Greenpeace and Senator Ted Stevens is a gay Frenchman!

[ 01-01-2006, 10:54 PM: Message edited by: ljb5 ]

[Cuyahoga Chuck]

Maybe I can explain my rant better.
Even if long term global warming prooves not to be in the cards, there still is the worry that a short but severe climate deviation might cause us trouble. There is an accepted hypothosis that everything on this earth is designed to live in some kind of climatological nich. And that swings of climate that last too long can proove deadly to living things that can't tolerate the new conditions.
Man has proven that he can survive almost anywhere but the things that we depend on like an assured food supply may not be able to cope as well as we.
So, what happens when populations face long term stress? They pick up their skirts and boogie to someplace where they believe their stress level will be lower. They migrate. And the worse the dislocation the bigger the migration. But we don't have anywhere to migrate to. Our culture is as good as it gets and most of us wouldn't last very long in a third world life style.
So, even if the recent years of unusual weather are not part of a long term weather change it would be prudent to examine what is happening very closly. And it wouldn't be a bad idea to attempt some modest experiments in climate stabilization since we now have a situation that's ideal for experimentation.

Charlie

[Paul G]

Ljb5

You have greenie wires crossed. Dont confuse your personal anger towards the right with the issue at hand. Which is cooler temperatures being interpreted as evidence of GW

[Peter Malcolm Jardine]

So dont make me laugh by going on about how much you believe in GW. Sure you might entertain the idea, and it might appeal to your sensibilities but like most of the rest of the world your behaviour indicates you dont really take it seriously. As usual, Rick, your logic is completely flawed. You suggest that because I take advantage of certain kinds of technologies that at some point use energy or pollute, as some sort of indicator that I don't take environmental planning seriously. That would be false, and the logic you used to support that argument is insupportable.

I spent a few years in environmental planning, conservation, and environmental intitiative planning. There are many many actions that can be taken to reduce the levels of pollution the human species produces, from the individual level to the corporate level. I do what I can individually, and I support initiatives through my tax dollars that will better the environment. I am willing to pay more in taxes, or goods and services to that end. Like most Canadians, I support Kyoto, not because it is ultimately the best solution to the problem, but it is a place to start. More than anything else, it raises public awareness of the consequences of greenhouse gases, and pollution in general.

My belief in Global Warming is irrelevant. I am not qualified to make comment on such an incredibly complex field of scientific endeavour. There is, however, a significant majority of the scientific community that supports this theory. It is not politics. Politics enter the equasion when it comes to the solutions proposed. I would be happy to hear your qualifications in the environmental field, perhaps your have not shared your academic degrees in climatology and the like. If this is the case, I would be happy to hear a qualified view that opposes global warming. Please direct me to any links to your research and published dissertations on the subject.

If you do not possess these qualifications, or do not have relevant experience in the field, your view is reduced to individual opinion. It is your right to hold such opinion, but again, in the face of almost overwhelming scientific opinion on the matter, you would be wrong.

The Bush administration has decided not to participate in the Kyoto accord. That is your country's democratic right. Sadly, your government has not proposed anything else to address the issue of Global Warming, instead, it denies the credibility of the scientific thought on the matter. Once again, George Bush and his administraion are not particularly credible in comparison to the larger scientific community he opposes on this issue.

Your country is, by the nature of it's size and industrialized nature, one of the worlds worst polluters. If that does not stir you to action, then I doubt anything will. That will not deter me in my efforts to make my country more accountable for the damage it does to the environment, and legislate policies that are more envirofriendly as a result.

[ljb5]

Originally posted by Paul G:
You have greenie wires crossed. Dont confuse your personal anger towards the right with the issue at hand. Which is cooler temperatures being interpreted as evidence of GWPaul, we got a little side-tracked here, so I started a new thread (http://www.woodenboat-ubb.com/cgi-bin/UBB/ultimatebb.cgi?ubb=get_topic;f=5;t=028644) to address the subject.

[Paul G]

Peter,

I posted that quote not Rick,

Sure I dont have any degrees in climatology so essentially its my opinion, just like yours.

Weight of opinion does not constitute proof, even if the entire scientific world hold an opinion its not neccessarily proof.

Moreover I stand by my position that if you are an adamant believer in GW and its dire consequences you had better put up or shut up. Otherwise its a dim sideshow in your life thats way down on the priority list.

So Peter tell me why we have advancing glaciers down here? And the coldest winter for a decade in europe?

[skuthorp]

Well said Chuck, I agree with the 'niche' comment. I don't think our species is threatened per se, but there may be a severe cull as a result of a series of health and climatic events. Civilisations have fallen as a result of overpopulation and overuse of resources before, and probably will again. If the climate is going to give us a kick in the pants I don't think there's anything we can do, it's too big an issue. Tied up with religion and our overweening view of ourselves as something outside of all the other species (it'll never happen to me/us). Self-interest will stop us from inconveniencing our own nationall groups in the interest of the species, especially if they're poor or live on a low island. I don't think this will save us though. It's just history repeating. I dont think we'll have to wait for a passing meteor, what was that about "not with a bang, but with a whimper"?
Hey, it's 3, I'm off to plant some more vegies :D

[Peter Malcolm Jardine]

Sorry about the mix up.

The Scientific community does not hold opinion on this, it has stated these opinions based on an incredible wealth of research and study over the last 50 years. Climatology at this level is a fairly new science, but global climate changes has been of real interest to this section of the scientific community.

As I've stated, I have had some experience in conservation and environmental planning, at your equivalent of the state level, although the province of Ontario is significantly larger than any state. I've done some investigative reading on Global Warming, and I could happily point you to some links, altho it's pretty dry reading.

A synopsis in a paragraph would be this:

The planet is slowly rising in temperature. Some of this may be due to a larger cycle, but most indications in research point to a faster, more dramatic spike in temperature in the last century. (industrial revolution as in) The study of the atmosphere has revealed changes that have been affected by the output of man made greenhouse gases, notably carbon dioxide and carbon monoxide.

This rise in temperature is contributing to the change in the directions and temperatures of significant ocean currents, affecting weather patterns world wide. This could result in warmer temperatures some places, colder in others, but the overall tendency is for globally warmer temperatures. The ice caps at both the north and south poles are shrinking at alarming rates over the past 100 years, and that rate is accelerating.

The consequences of Global warming are disruptions in weather patterns in the form of droughts, storms, cold, all in less predictable patterns. This will result in massive losses in agricultural sectors, as well as natural disaster that result in property loss, and the loss of human life.

Here is a very interesting link that I found out about from a colleague from the University at Bern Switzerland. The professor mentioned here is a leading edge researcher in climatology.


Thomas Stocker - University of Bern, Switzerland
"Irreversible Climate Transitions: Future Trouble?"

Records from ice cores and marine sediments send us a clear message: ocean circulation and atmospheric temperatures can change within decades. More alarmingly, recent analyses demonstrate that such changes can occur after slow but steady changes of the background climate, once a threshold is crossed. This finding is relevant for the question of whether the northern extension of the Gulf Stream will be altered in response to the ongoing global warming. Climate models tell us that not only the amount of warming, but also the rate of the warming will be critical whether or not such large-scale ocean circulation changes will occur and whether they will be irreversible.

Thomas Stocker is Professor of Climate and Environmental Physics at the University of Bern and head of the Division of Climate and Environmental Physics of the Physics Institute since 1993. He developed the first climate models of intermediate complexity, and he investigates the role of the carbon cycle in the climate system, in particular, the impact of abrupt climate changes on the biogeochemical cycles. He is the coordinator of the chapter "Global Climate Projection" in the forthcoming Fourth Assessment Report of the UN Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC). http://www.climate.unibe.ch/~stocker/

[ 01-01-2006, 11:33 PM: Message edited by: Peter Malcolm Jardine ]

[ljb5]

PMJ, replace "dearth" with "wealth."

[Peter Malcolm Jardine]

Here is the press release from Dr Stockers latest research.... very very interesting... and sobering too.

New Evidence Extends Greenhouse Gas Record from Ice Cores by 50 Percent, Adding 210,000 Years

With the first in-depth analysis of the air bubbles trapped in the “EPICA Dome C” ice core from East Antarctica, European researchers have extended the greenhouse gas record back to 650,000 years before the present.

This 210,000-year extension of atmospheric carbon dioxide and methane records -- encompassing two full glacial cycles -- should help scientists better understand climate change and the nature of the current warm period on Earth. The record may also aid researchers in reducing uncertainty in predictions of future climate change and help to clarify when humans began significantly changing the balance of greenhouse gasses in Earth’s atmosphere.

EPICA is the European Project for Ice Coring in Antarctica. The new ice core, initially described in 2004, is from a site in East Antarctica and is known as EPICA Dome C. This work represents a long-term European research collaboration and appears in two “Reports” and an accompanying “Perspective” article in the 25 November 2005 issue of the journal Science, published by AAAS the nonprofit science society.

One “Report” chronicles the stable relationship between climate and the carbon cycle during the late Pleistocene. The second “Report” documents
atmospheric methane and nitrous oxide levels over the same period, from 390,000 to 650,000 years before the present.

The analysis highlights the fact that today’s rising atmospheric carbon dioxide concentration, at 380 parts per million by volume, is already 27 percent higher than its highest recorded level during the last 650,000 years, said Science author Thomas Stocker of the Physics Institute of the University of Bern, in Bern, Switzerland, who serves as the corresponding author for both papers. “We have added another piece of information showing that the timescales on which humans have changed the composition of the atmosphere are extremely short compared to the natural time cycles of the climate system,” Stocker explained.

The new work confirms the stable relationship between Antarctic climate and the greenhouse gasses carbon dioxide and methane during the last four glacial cycles. The new ice core analysis also extends this relationship back another two glacial cycles to a time when the warm “interglacial” periods were milder and longer than more recent warm periods, according to the European researchers.

The fact that carbon dioxide and methane levels were lower during the relatively mild warm periods of the two additional cycles compared to the warmer warm periods of the last 400,000 years is especially interesting for the study of climate sensitivity, which is a measure of how the climate system reacts when atmospheric carbon dioxide concentrations double, explained Science author Dominique Raynaud from LGGE in Grenoble, France.

The new atmospheric and climate records from the EPICA Dome C ice core also indicate that the response of the natural carbon cycle to climate warming remains the same over time – in terms of the mechanism involved and the degree to which greenhouse gasses further amplify climate change, explained Science author Jean Jouzel from LSCE and Institut Pierre Simon Laplace in France.

The EPICA Dome C ice core contains hundreds of thousands of years of atmospheric air samples within tiny bubbles chronologically trapped in ice.
The air bubbles form when snowflakes fall and trap tiny bubbles of air containing a record of global greenhouse gas concentrations. In the two Science papers, the researchers document carbon dioxide and methane concentrations from 390,000 to 650,000 years before present, providing some overlap with a similar record from the Vostok ice core – now, the second longest ice core record -- and extending the Vostok record by 210,000 years.

The researchers also report on a third greenhouse gas, nitrous oxide; but the nitrous oxide record in EPICA Dome C is more fragmented and less clear due to artifacts in the ice that appear related to the dust levels.

The new ice core analysis provides insights on our present interglacial warm period through a glimpse into Antarctic climate and greenhouse gas concentrations during the most recent warm period that is relatively similar to our current warm period. Known as Marine Isotope Stage 11 or MIS 11, this analog warm period occurred between 420,000 and 400,000 years and is not completely covered by the Vostok record.

The similarities between our current warm period and MIS are primarily due to similar configuration of the orbits of the Earth around the Sun. The relative positions of the Earth and Sun are thought to be the key driver of ice age cycles.

“MIS 11 shows us that the climate system can indeed reside in a warm period for 20,000 or 30,000 years, something that we can’t say based on the last three warm phases which are no longer than about 10,000 years each,” said Stocker. We are currently about 10,000 years into our current warm period. The older warm periods also documented in these papers, known as MIS 13 and 15, may have been about as long as MIS 11 – a finding that contrasts with the argument scientists have made in the past that our current warm period is exceptionally long, according to the new studies. The scientists note, however, that the records for MIS 13 and 15 are not as clear as they are for MIS 11. One complicating factor is that the ice core records do not exactly match records from marine sediments that are used to help date the ice core data.

New insights into the impact early human activities such as land clearing and rice culture had on atmospheric greenhouse gas concentrations, the topic of several recent studies, are also now available, thanks to the methane and carbon dioxide records from the EPICA Dome C ice core. The new record shows that natural variability can result in significant oscillations in greenhouse gasses during some interglacial periods and raises the possibility that early human activities may not be responsible for the greenhouse gas variability seen as early as 10,000 years ago, according to the author of a related “Perspective” article.

The greenhouse gas record from EPICA Dome C during past ice ages also provides indirect evidence for abrupt climate change in the past, the authors found. There are variations in the methane records from glacial periods that appear similar to the greenhouse gas changes in the most recent ice age that have been linked to abrupt climate change. This suggests that abrupt climatic events on time scales relevant to societies may be common features of the last climatic cycles.

The stable relationship between carbon dioxide, methane and Antarctic climate over the last 650,000 years highlights one of the major unsolved mysteries of climate change -- the origins of climate-greenhouse gas relationships. Organic decomposition in subtropical wetlands remains a strong candidate for explaining the climate-methane relationship. On the other hand, oceans seem to play a critical role in the climate-carbon dioxide relationship; and the new work strengthens the idea that high latitude Southern Ocean processes are important for controlling glacial-interglacial variations in carbon dioxide, according to the “Perspective” author who says that retrieval and analysis of even older ice cores may provide more definitive answers.

### “Stable Carbon Cycle-Climate Relationship During the Late Pleistocene,” by U. Siegenthaler, T.F. Stocker, E. Monnin, D. Lüthi, J. Schwander and B. Stauffer at University of Bern, in Bern, Switzerland;

D. Raynaud and J.-M. Barnola at Laboratoire de Glaciologie et de Géophysique de l'Environnement (CNRS) St Martin d'Hères Cedex, France; H. Fischer at Alfred-Wegener-Institute for Polar and Marine Research (AWI) in
Bremerhaven, Germany;

V. Masson-Delmotte and J. Jouzel at LSCE and Institut Pierre Simon Laplace in France.

“Atmospheric Methane and Nitrous Oxide of the Late Pleistocene from Antarctic Ice Cores,” by R. Spahni, T. Stocker, G. Hausammann, K. Kawamura, J. Flückiger and Jakob Schwander at University of Bern, in Bern, Switzerland;

J. Chappellaz, L. Loulergue and D. Raynaud at Laboratoire de Glaciologie et de Géophysique de l'Environnement (CNRS) in St Martin d'Hères Cedex, France;
V. Masson-Delmotte, J. Jouzel at LSCE and Institut Pierre Simon Laplace in France. K. Kawamura is now at Scripps Institution of Oceanography, University of California, San Diego, La Jolla, United States. J. Flückiger is now at Institute of Arctic and Alpine Research, University of Colorado at Boulder in Colorado, United States.

The work described in the Siegenthaler et al. and Spahni et al. Science papers is a contribution to the “European Project for Ice Coring in Antarctica” (EPICA), a joint ESF (European Science Foundation)/EC scientific programme, funded by the European Commission and by national contributions from Belgium, Denmark, France, Germany, Italy, the Netherlands, Norway, Sweden, Switzerland and the United Kingdom. The researchers acknowledge long-term financial support by the Swiss NSF, the University of Bern and the Swiss Federal Agency of Energy, and EC Project EPICA-MIS. Support was also provided by the French programme PNEDC (INSU-CNRS).

The American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) is the world's largest general scientific society, and publisher of the journal, Science (www.sciencemag.org). AAAS was founded in 1848, and serves some 262 affiliated societies and academies of science, serving 10 million individuals. Science has the largest paid circulation of any peer-reviewed general science journal in the world, with an estimated total readership of one million. The non-profit AAAS (www.aaas.org) is open to all and fulfills its mission to "advance science and serve society" through initiatives in science policy; international programs; science education; and more. For the latest research news, log onto EurekAlert!, www.eurekalert.org, (http://www.eurekalert.org,) the premier science-news Web site, a service of AAAS.

[ 01-01-2006, 11:47 PM: Message edited by: Peter Malcolm Jardine ]

[ljb5]

Originally posted by Ironmule:
I don't <u>personally</u> know any SUV driving conservatives.I don't think I should be held responsible for your lack of worldly experience.

Other than those people you <u>personally</u> know, what do you know about Halliburton, Exxon-Mobil, Ted Stevens, Arbusto, Spectrum 7, Harken, Enron, ANWR, Saudi Arabia and Unocal?

Wouldn't that be weird if, maybe, outside of your <u>personal</u> experience, there was a whole world which you don't know about?

[ 01-01-2006, 11:57 PM: Message edited by: ljb5 ]

[Paul G]

Scientists at work....


"We have to offer up scary scenarios, make simplified, dramatic statements, and make little mention of any doubts we may have. Each of us has to decide what the right balance is between being effective and being honest."
Stephen Schneider (leading advocate of the global warming theory)
(in interview for Discover magazine, Oct 1989)

[Peter Malcolm Jardine]

That's mostly because stupid people don't read dry research papers. They do read the National Inquirer.

Sorry, I don't have sympathy for people who don't do their homework as a global citizen.

George Bush is a prime example. Dumb as shrubbery. That's his fault.

[ljb5]

Originally posted by Paul G:
(in interview for Discover magazine, Oct 1989) [/QUOTE]

You find one quote in a lay journal sixteen years ago and you think that contradicts a mountain of evidence?

You're grasping for straws.

[Rick Tyler]

Originally posted by Peter Malcolm Jardine:
On the contrary, my world is rarely populated by absolutes of any kind. Would you like some references to things that you have written on this forum that indicate a certain tendency on your part to state things in absolute terms? It would take two or three minutes to find a couple of hundred examples, but I would be willing to take the time if your recall fails you.

[Rick Tyler]

Originally posted by ljb5:
You find one quote in a lay journal sixteen years ago and you think that contradicts a mountain of evidence? You're grasping for straws.He did take the time to find an external resource for his position. This is something that you have not yet done yourself.

[Peter Malcolm Jardine]

I don't define absolutes. My opinions are not one's that are grasped out of the air. For each area of discussion, particularly in science, but in many other areas as well, there are people who devote their lives to researching those areas. I read what they have to say.

[Peter Malcolm Jardine]

I've tried that Rick, and he still can't admit to a mistake Really? I make mistakes all the time.... of course you're american. tongue.gif

[Peter Malcolm Jardine]

It would take two or three minutes to find a couple of hundred examples, but I would be willing to take the time if your recall fails you. Sure... fill your boots. :D

[Peter Malcolm Jardine]

Probably prayed your way out of it anyway right?

[George Jung]

I was going to say lbj and PMJ were like peas in a pod, but that's not right; but they're both 'true believers' (can you imagine how they'd get fried if religion was their thing?), just different agendas. lbj hates anything not Democrat; PMJ has a 'thing' for the good ol' US of A....

And sorry I agreed on that little comment about lbj being able to carry on a normal, coherent, non-abusive discussion; shouldn't've called his attention to it, I guess...

[Peter Malcolm Jardine]

George, just a small correction. I have "a thing" for people who proclaim that bullshiit is solid gold, whether they be Amercun, Canadian, Pakistani or Martian. Since this is a forum dominated by americans, the largest number of bull****ters is predominantly from your country. To follow that, it is usually bullshiit associated with flag waving, which is really idiotic.

The global warming debate, based on the evidence, is between the people who think the world is round, and those who think it is flat. Pick your side. :D

[ 01-02-2006, 12:57 AM: Message edited by: Peter Malcolm Jardine ]

[Paul G]

Who is clutching? Heres an interesting cut and paste. BTW Ljb5 your intellectual arrogance is spectacular! Sadly your method is transparent. Draw your opponent into your field of "research" bluff and bluster about zillions of people/scientists/hobbits/tree-frogs/academic papers etc and then attack them if they cant follow your logic. Then you eventually add in the left/right political thing as if that is the only measure of the validity of any discussion.

"Do all of the world's climate scientists agree that humanity is causing dangerous global warming?
A California history professor, Naomi Oreskes, says she recently looked at 928 peer-reviewed research studies in a data base on "climate change" and found "none of the papers disagreed with the consensus position" on the Greenhouse Theory.
Normally, getting consensus among scientists is like herding cats. Dr. Oreskes' finding of complete accord on global warming was so remarkable it was published in Science (Dec. 3) and the Washington Post (Dec. 26).
To cross-check her consensus, I dialed up Google Scholar and plugged in her "climate change" keywords.
I got 213,000 papers on climate change, and flipped through the first 300. Many endorsed the Greenhouse Theory. Especially those from the UN's Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change and from climate modelers who get billions of dollars to scare us about CO2.
But not all.
The University of Arizona's Tom Swetnam had studied fire scars in giant sequoia trees to reconstruct past climate periods. He found a warmer climate in the American Southwest from 1000 to 1300 AD that corresponded with the Medieval Warming in Europe. He also found cool climate periods during the Dark Ages (500 to 1000 AD) and the Little Ice Age (1300-1850). That's important evidence of climate variability-on America's Pacific Coast. The North Atlantic is the only region where the UN has admitted these prior climate changes have occurred.
The "climate change" keywords also yielded one of the most famous studies in modern climate science: Gerard Bond's 2001 Science paper, "Persistent Solar Influence on North Atlantic Climate During the Holocene." Being a historian, Ms. Oreskes may not have recognized that Bond's physical evidence of past climate cycles trumps the unproven Greenhouse Theory. In a seabed sediment core, Bond found a series of moderate, natural climate cycles-roughly 1500 years long, plus or minus 500 years. They stretch back hundreds of thousands of years. His 2001 paper confirmed the cycle's link to variations in the sun's irradiance, through carbon 14 and beryllium 10 isotopes in the sediments.
Ms. Oreskes should have looked under "climate variability." Bond and his colleagues don't think our climate is changing so much as varying naturally, but in roughly predictable ways. There's been a whole series of Chapman conferences on climate variability, with another proposed this year at the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institute.
Three other papers found under "climate variability": Switzerland's Jan Esper and Fritz Schweingruber studied tree line changes in the mountains of Siberia, where the boles of one tree variety are preserved-living and dead- for hundreds of years. They found the treelines around 1000 AD were 30 meters higher than today, indicating the Medieval Warming had higher temperatures than we do. They also found the treelines had receded around the year 1350, at the start of the Little Ice Age, and advanced again with the Modern Warming.
Berger and Von Rad retrieved a 5000-year sediment core from the Arabian Sea-and found the same 1500-year cycle already found by Bond in the North Atlantic. It revealed the unnamed cold period before the Roman Empire, the 1150-year Roman cycle, the 900-year Medieval cycle, and the beginning of the Modern Cycle. Each cycle moves Earth's temperatures 2 degrees C above and then 2 degrees C below the long-term mean.
J.P. Kennett and a scientific working group on "Climate Variability and Mechanisms" concluded that Earth's climate in the past 10,000 years "is now known to have been highly unstable and prone to major, rapid changes, especially warmings, that occurred briefly within a few decades or less. . .The scientific community has made major strides in documenting the history of millennial-decadal scale climate change. . ."

There's no need for scientists to vote on whether the Earth has warmed in the past 150 years. Ms. Oreskes and the UN bureaucrats just need some way to distinguish their Greenhouse Effect from the natural cycle.
Let me suggest one: the Greenhouse Theory says CO2 will first warm the atmosphere above the Earth. The atmosphere will then overheat the planet by radiating heat from above.
So far, the Earth's surface is warming two or three times faster than the atmosphere. That's a big Mother Nature vote against the Greenhouse Theory.

[Paul G]

The global warming debate, based on the evidence, is between the people who think the world is round, and those who think it is flat. Pick your side. Debate; Contention in words or arguments; discussion for the
purpose of elucidating truth or influencing action; strife
in argument; controversy; as, the debates in Parliament or
in Congress.

[PeterSibley]

and you guys reckon PMJ is stuck in his ways :D You really should read what you type......talk about opinions set in concrete!!!

[ljb5]

Originally posted by Paul G:
Sadly your method is transparent. Draw your opponent into your field of "research"...Dude, you started this thread. Don't accuse me of 'drawing you in'!

You just posted an interesting review of some studies. Basically, it just said there is a lot of agreement about global warming.

You also seem a little confused. Climate change in the past is an important issue and helps us study anthropogenic global warming --- but it's not the same thing. In the past, there were some periods of warming; that doesn't mean that now, there isn't something different happening.

You're right, we do need to distinguish the "natural cycle" from the "man made" effect. They might both be happening.

I think you've misstated the greenhouse theory. I'm not familiar with this 'radiating heat from above' theory. Think about a car with a dark interior parked in the sun -- the windshield traps the radiation, but it's the seats that get hot. Just like a greenhouse.

Of course, that's not really you mis-stating the theory is it? It's Dennis Avery of the Hudson Institute, a right-wing think tank and lobbying firm.

[Joe ( Cold Spring on Hudson )]

NASA Report On Global Temp Trends (http://data.giss.nasa.gov/gistemp/2005/)

Your getting warmer ;)


Record warmth in 2005 is notable, because global temperature has not received any boost from a tropical El Niño this year. The 1998 meteorological year, on the contrary, was lifted 0.2°C above the trend line by the strongest El Niño of the past century.

Global warming is now 0.6°C in the past three decades and 0.8°C in the past century. It is no longer correct to say that "most global warming occurred before 1940". More accurately, there was slow global warming, with large fluctuations, over the century up to 1975 and subsequent rapid warming of almost 0.2°C per decade.

Recent warming coincides with rapid growth of human-made greenhouse gases. Climate models show that the rate of warming is consistent with expectations (5). The observed rapid warming thus gives urgency to discussions about how to slow greenhouse gas emission

[ 01-02-2006, 07:52 AM: Message edited by: Joe ( Cold Spring on Hudson ) ]

[George.]

Originally posted by Art Read:
...we have not filled every last inch of the planet with a starving mass of desperate humanity, fresh unpolluted water is not a worldwide "scarcity"...You don't get out of the US much, do you?

[Peter Malcolm Jardine]

Nobody reads anything except if it agrees with what they already believe.... at least out here anyway :( :rolleyes:

[Peter Malcolm Jardine]

Lets get em all together.

[BrianW]

From PMJ's posted article...


The analysis highlights the fact that today’s rising atmospheric carbon dioxide concentration, at 380 parts per million by volume, is already 27 percent higher than its highest recorded level during the last 650,000 years, said Science author Thomas Stocker of the Physics Institute of the University of Bern, in Bern, Switzerland, who serves as the corresponding author for both papers. “We have added another piece of information showing that the timescales on which humans have changed the composition of the atmosphere are extremely short compared to the natural time cycles of the climate system,” Stocker explained.Not sure anyone doubted that carbon dioxide levels would be higher, but it's good to know anyhow.


The greenhouse gas record from EPICA Dome C during past ice ages also provides indirect evidence for abrupt climate change in the past, the authors found. There are variations in the methane records from glacial periods that appear similar to the greenhouse gas changes in the most recent ice age that have been linked to abrupt climate change. This suggests that abrupt climatic events on time scales relevant to societies may be common features of the last climatic cycles.So now maybe, this has happened before?

It's a good article. It states that humans are doing something to the earth, yet points out that based their studies that this sort of thing may have happened before humans arrived onscene.

[Dan McCosh]

Think about a car with a dark interior parked in the sun -- the windshield traps the radiation, but it's the seats that get hot. Just like a greenhouse. This is a statement of pretty much the exact opposite of the basic concept of global warming due to so-called "greenhouse gases". Without any greenhouse gas, solar radiation passes through the atmosphere and warms the earth's surface. Greenhouse gases absorb the radiation in the atmosphere, heating it directly.
The "greenhouse" effect is layman's slang--often misunderstood. It is more like a sauna than a greenhouse.

[ljb5]

Originally posted by Dan McCosh:
Without any greenhouse gas, solar radiation passes through the atmosphere and warms the earth's surface.That's true with and without greenhouse gases. Solar radiation has a peak intensity of 500nm, which passes right through the atmosphere, with almost not absorption.

The greenhouse effect comes into play when the earth radiates energy out into space.

The earth abosrbs the sun's energy and re-radiates it at a much longer wavelength - 10,000nm. At this wavelength, the energy cannot pass out of the atmosphere.

Energy from the sun always goes directly to the earth's surface, whether or not there is a greenhouse atmosphere. The question is whether or not energy from the earth is permitted to escape.

You're right, however, it's a little different than how a real greenhouse works. It's actually simpler.

In a real greenhouse, there are two effects, (1) trapping warm air so it doesn't move away by convection and (2) conversion of radiation and frequency-selective emmision. Salt is transparent to long-wavelenght light, so if you make a greenhouse out of salt (which has been done) you trap the warm air, but not the radiation. This works nearly as well as a greenhouse made of glass. On the other hand, they make wavelength-selective plastics for greenhouses to modify the emission and absorption profiles.

In the atmospheric greenhouse effect, there is no heat loss due to convection (the atmosphere doesn't blow away), so it's just a question of radiation trapping.

[ 01-03-2006, 04:39 PM: Message edited by: ljb5 ]