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Is Global Warming Behind Earth's Gravity Shifting?
MichaelH writes "The good folks at JPL along with the Royal Observatory of Belgium have an explanation for the recent changes in Earth's magnetic field: the melting of sub-polar glaciers causing a mass shift towards the equator. Starting in 1997, a noticeable change in Earth's gravitational field was observed; Earth was beginning to develop a 'bulging waistline.' Sounds like it's time for a diet with fewer greenhouse gases...."
I *love* it when people postulate that humans are the cause for 'global warming'. It's been shown that
But it has never been proven that human activity of any form did cause, (or could stop) the climate change everyone seems so keen to label global warming.
News flash: Global warming itself is still theory. It has some amount of scientific evidence behind it, but some against as well. This is to say nothing about the theory of human dynamics on climate.
What is happening, however, is there are groups out there who believe that until we know for certian that we are the problem, we should assume we are and stop what we can. These people are called extremists or fanatics.
I do not deny that the planet is changing, and likely it is due in part to human life. But it would be just as irresponsible for us to run in and fix something we don't understand (and may well not be 'broken') as it would to wontonly destroy our atmosphere (which is what some are claiming we do).
Yes, yes, let's reduce our pollution. I, as well as many others reading this, have mild but chronic asthma. Sure, I'd like to breathe cleaner air and know that I won't get as ill as frequently as I currently do.
Let's just not become couriers of FUD in the process.
-Adam
If it ain't broke, fix it 'till it is.
Earth First! (we'll strip mine the other planets later)
The White House recently decided that it would be prudent to investigate further before taking any action to combat global warming. Debates were mostly over what research strategy to use. Of particular concern is ensuring that the United States economy doesn't suffer too much.
Great!
So that's what happens when we come out of an Ice Age...
It's amazing how often this point is convieniently ignored.
-- MarkusQ
Okay, let's assume that burning fossil fuels isn't what's causing global warming, and we reduce or eliminate our use of fossil fuels anyway.
So now we've just managed to clean up our air to the point where Los Angeles and Toronto no longer have pollution advisories on the Weather Channel, but Rio de Janerio and Amersterdam are flooded.
Well, we've just done one very good thing, and the other thing was expected anyway and didn't happen overnight, so it's not like we had to rush a huge evacuation or anything. Maybe we've just built better dikes instead.
If we *don't* do these things, then Los Angeles and Toronto will have even lower air quality *and* Rio and Amsterdam will be flooded too.
But what of the costs! They'll be enormous! Well, that's what they said about replacing CFC's, eliminating particulate waste from coal power plants, and not using PCB's to cool big electrical transformers. Oddly enough, coal power plants are now selling that particulate waste as a replacement for gypsum in fire-resistant wallboard, the extra cost of not using CFC's in your car's air conditioner is about $20, not $1500, and your electric utility is now spouting on about how good and wonderful they are for not using PCB's in your friendly neighbourhood power transformer (despite the fact that the government had to force them to do so).
Even better is the fact that we can reduce our current CO2 production just by not wasting our fuel! Are we so wealthy that we don't have to worry about how much we spend on fuel, but not wealthy enough to not use it so much? There was one company here in Canada that went to parliament saying that "hey, this Kyoto thing isn't so hard. We met those goals already and look at the millions of dollars we saved!"
By forcing people to look at the problem, we can start to find solutions. A large part of the problem here is waste. Waste is bad because its a sign of inefficiency. Why can't some people realize that when it's so blazingly obvious?
"No problem. I have the capacity to do infinite work so long as you don't mind that my quality approaches zero."-Dilbert
Even if that were true, it would be irrelevant. CO2 emissions do cause increases in average global temperature; that is elementary physics. The only question is the degree and when those increases will lead to catastrophes. But increases and catastrophes will inevitably result sooner or later if emissions continue at current levels or grow.
But it would be just as irresponsible for us to run in and fix something we don't understand (and may well not be 'broken') as it would to wontonly destroy our atmosphere (which is what some are claiming we do).
Quite to the contrary: the only responsible thing to do is to greatly reduce our dependence on fossil fuels. Not only does that address issues of global warming as best we can, in developed nations like ours, it is also good for the economy, for defense, and for quality of life. The only groups who don't benefit are entrenched interests afraid of change.
In fact, it was completely irresponsible to start such massive changes on a global scale in the first place, initiated by what amounts to a very small group of people, with no oversight and no democratic input from most of the affected populations.
Let's just not become couriers of FUD in the process.
Given the global and irreversible nature of these changes, fear, uncertainty, and doubt are completely justified.
What I find particularly ironic about the bogus arguments you are repeating is that they often come from the same people that formulate our drug policy on tenuous or disreputable scientific evidence. Apparently, it's not OK for me to voluntary inhale or ingest substances that only affect me and have never been demonstrated to be harmful. But it's perfectly OK for big companies to emit substances that I can't escape from and that the scientific mainstream pretty much agrees are going to have deleterious effects on people and the world.
It is debatable to what degree the current, measurable increases in global temperatures are due to human emissions of greenhouse gasses.
It is absolutely not debatable that human emissions of greenhouse gasses will lead to serious and costly problems sooner or later--that is just basic physics.
Yo, Slashdot editors, please loose the P.C. Crap.
When you don't like or understand the scientific realities, you just accuse people of political bias. Sadly, that's how a lot of political decision making happens in the US today.