Slashdot Mirror
Siberian Permafrost Melting
TeknoHog writes "New
Scientist Reports on a remarkable runaway process of global warming
that has been going on in Siberia for the past few years. 'Western Siberia has warmed faster than almost anywhere else on the planet, with an increase in average temperatures of some 3C in the last 40 years.' As a result, a million
square kilometers (the area of France and Germany) of frozen peat bog have
been found to be melting, according to Russian and international
scientists. This releases methane, a potent greenhouse gas, which
contributes to further global warming."
Slap a Stirling on that thar peat bog!
That aside, one wonders what presidents eat when they get into the White House. How can one protect American jobs while exporting our entire industrial base with the so called out-sourcing?
PS: I am speaking as an American.
http://www.waverley.gov.uk/waste/peat.asp#What%20i s%20Peat?
Peat is made of incompletely decomposed plant remains, which accumulate in waterlogged soils over thousands of years. It occurs because the natural processes of decay are prevented by the acidic water logging and depleted oxygen.
If the Siberian wasteland was covered with plants and water for thousands of years, doesn't that imply that during that time the wasteland was not frozen?
And, if it was not frozen, doesn't that imply that it was warmer in the distant past than it was in the recent past?
So, the question is, what caused that warming thousands of years ago and what is the "proper" temperature for the earth?
If the earth wants to return the tundra to a boglike state, more power to him!
Just like the "perms" my wife Betty-Lou get's down at the dang booteek or whateer that durned place is called. Yeap -- they call it a "permunant", but it just a stinkin bunch of moppy curls that done go way after a few weeks. And I always tell that woman she's throwin her $5 away, but she won't do no listenen!
But about this "perma" snow or whartever -- can you believe that?? Leave it to them Russkies to not even know how to make snow. Why them commies ain't never done nuthin right. Ain't nothin like good ol' USA snow, though I don't ever really see any here in Tennessee, American snow is the best. And I bet is stays frosty much longer than that phony snow from any commie or french country.
hey, Global warming is just a THEORY...
oh, I guess I should add that ID is just an idea, but I will omit that in order to dupe the retarded public.
I am the Alpha and the Omega-3
The last 100 years has been just one big huge orgy of mass consumption and it still continues, spreading to developing countries like China. But anyone who thinks we can just continue to rape the globe forever with no consquences is delusional.
Question is, are we going to be stupid enough to continue down this wreckless path? Does humanity secretly have an unfulfilled death wish? Was World War II just a fluke or was it a flash of the selfish inhumanity really lies within each of us?
Listen I'm willing to admit I'm part of the problem. I recognize things have to change. Each of needs to wake up, find a way to snap out of these unsustainable lifestyles we all lead and avoid the terrible consequences that surely await us if we don't.
Let's quit being fucking idiots. What do we need to do?
---Technology will liberate us if it doesn't enslave us first.
The climate on planet Earth has gotten less than a degree warmer in the last 150 years.
I'd contribute it to the global cycle of change just like spring, summer, fall, and winter,
day and night, axial tilt, the tides, the ice age,
and the inevitability of mid-season on FOX.
But let's not jump to any conclusions.
Before you mod me down, remember, good scientists ask lots of questions, annoying questions.
Good scientists ask a lot of questions, but then they do research to try to find answers. The problem with this topic is that every jackass on both sides thinks he's an environmental scientist because he noticed Earth used to be hot or that it's really big or that we burn a lot of crap. Or, more likely, he heard someone on the radio who heard from "a scientist" that everything is going to either be okay or explode, depending on which station you listen to.
I wish everyone who didn't at least have a very strong chemistry background would just shut up about it. Which might be quite a few people on Slashdot, but every time my boss mentions it, he deserves to be punched in the mouth.
I don't know. I'm not one of those chemistry guys. I don't have the kind of equipment you'd need to measure this stuff. My stance on the issue is entirely based on the fact that I don't think it's a good idea to be pumping billions of tons of anything into the atmosphere, and that should get slowed down a little.
..this submission is a good example of why your statistics aren't representative of the real picture of climate change. When you say, "Hey, it's not even 1 degree warmer! Bok bok bok!", you're talking about average temperatures.
Meanwhile, some places -- like Siberia -- are heating up, while others -- like warm ocean currents that heat air -- are cooling down. So it's not surprising that some areas are getting hotter and some are getting cooler. The point is that we can see evidence that a climactic equilibrium that has existed for hundreds of years is now becoming much more dynamic and unpredictable. And we're probably to blame for at least some of it, and maybe most of it.
Anyway, the short version of this speech is: Averages are often terribly misleading statistics.
'Western Siberia has warmed faster than almost anywhere else on the planet, with an increase in average temperatures of some 3C in the last 40 years.'
Hmm. Sounds like local warming, not global warming.
In my opinion, you can't believe anything you read about "global warming" or "climate change" -- for or against the idea -- because there's so much bullshit coming from both sides pushing their agendas.
I am listening to Michael Crichton's STATE OF FEAR book, and I'll admit I have my doubts now about global warming claims. Or at least I'm more skeptical now about claims from either side. Suffice it to say, Crichton is normally a very astute researcher for his books, even though he obviously bends the truth to make his fiction more interesting.
What if we just all try to not waste as much stuff (food, electricity, natural resources), and assume it'll help?
Ironically, the word ironically is often used incorrectly.
GOOFUS has a PhD.
GALLANT has a PhD in a field unrelated to his research.
GOOFUS gets little respect as a scientist outside the scientific community.
GALLANT gets little respect as a scientist inside the scientific community.
GOOFUS drives a beat-up old car.
GALLANT drives a BMW unless his chauffeur is driving.
GOOFUS wears street clothes to work, maybe a lab suit on occasion.
GALLANT wears three piece suits at all times.
GOOFUS is employed by a "university", a "hospital", or a "laboratory".
GALLANT is employed by a "Coalition", an "Institute", an "Association", a "Foundation", a "Council", or a "White House".
GOOFUS earns $30000 per year unless they cut his funding.
GALLANT earns $200000 per year but makes his real money from speaking fees.
GOOFUS lives anywhere in the country.
GALLANT lives in a wealthy area near Washington DC, but may have additional homes elsewhere.
GOOFUS may sometimes be filmed standing in front of big melting icebergs.
GALLANT may be filmed sitting in front of a bookcase or standing behind a podium at a $2000 per plate fundraiser, although there may be ice melting in his drink.
GOOFUS is a dues-paying member of several scientific grassroots organizations.
GALLANT is on the payroll of several scientific astroturf organizations.
GOOFUS gets summoned for jury duty but is never picked as a juror.
GALLANT claims "the jury is still out" on evolution or global warming, since he considers himself to be on the jury.
GOOFUS maintains the world is five billion years old.
GALLANT isn't really saying, but creationists distribute his pamphlets all the time.
GOOFUS claims the world is warming as a direct result of human activity.
GALLANT either claims that climate change doesn't exist, or if it does, that humans have nothing to do with it.
GOOFUS and his graduate students do the dirty work of collecting raw data and looking for conclusions to be drawn from it.
GALLANT does the dirty work of discrediting GOOFUS by manipulating his data in Excel with statistically invalid techniques.
GOOFUS writes scientific papers and grant proposals.
GALLANT writes the nation's environmental legislation and a column for the Wall Street Journal's editorial page.
GOOFUS draws scientific conclusions from the data he collects that usually come out in agreement with the scientific consensus.
GALLANT paints the scientific consensus as being entirely political in nature and enjoys comparing himself to Galileo.
GOOFUS is heavily trained to be a skeptic and to treat information from all sources with a skeptical mind.
GALLANT is heavily marketed as a skeptic but reserves his skepticism for GOOFUS.
GOOFUS isn't paid much attention by the press since his opinions are commonplace among scientists.
GALLANT holds maverick opinions for a scientist which keeps him busy running from one balanced talk show to the next.
GOOFUS has no PR skills.
GALLANT leverages his PR experience all the time, although he has access to paid PR staff.
GOOFUS claims the sky is falling and we have to take painful steps to reduce CO2 emissions now.
GALLANT claims the free market will take care of it and recommends solving the problem by conning Zimbabwe out of their pollution credits.
GOOFUS advises his kids not to go into science.
GALLANT advises the president.
It's a mistake to think of this as a linear trend. It is accelerating; also it takes some decades to warm up to a given forcing. What we see now is the warming we already committed to in 1980. What's more, policies themselves take time to develop and implement, so really what we see now was pretty much the inevitable warming that we had in place by 1960 or so.
In effect, we are already committed to fifty years of more warming. If we don't get a grip on it, there is no reason to expect it won't accelerate, and go on for a very long time. If we do nothing as far as policy is concerned, the science tells us pretty clearly that things will keep getting more out of whack and faster.
The question is, when do we decide to do something about it? Until the coal runs out or we get it into our heads that it is time to act, whatever we see at any given moment will be a small fraction of what we are already committed to.
When I first started studying this matter in 1991, I believed that the world would start taking action by about now, so I did not believe people who saw this as the biggest problem around.
I was wrong.
At this point we are in big trouble and still lots of folks are coming up with irrational arguments for ignoring it.
mt
One doesn't have to be a liberal to believe in science... just intelligent. Ya Gomer.
Tell me what you believe...I'll tell you what you should see.
Just hits me strange.
So what was this frozen peat bog before? How did peat grow in ice?
> There is not a *single* scientific report that can prove Global Warming, even as a theory. It's only the nut-job-leftists that tout their unprovable theories as fact
FYI, "global warming" is a measurable phenomenon. A theory would be something that explains it.
And AFAICT, the only scientists disputing the anthropogenic theory are those who have sold their souls to the oil companies.
Sheesh, evil *and* a jerk. -- Jade
Why does your political leaning have anything to do with whether you believe humankind is causing global warming? If you're that far gone, you're not judging the issue on the evidence; you're believing whatever fits most comfortably with your pre-established worldview.
I should buy some cement.
> We NeoCons don't deny that the climate is changing; we deny that it's the fault of mankind. We maintain that climate change is a natural part of the planet's life cycle.
Since it's going to screw up your golden age regardless of what's causing it, why aren't you interested in doing whatever is possible to reverse it?
Sheesh, evil *and* a jerk. -- Jade
Why not put more r&d money into alternative fuels and get the gas guzzlers off the roads once and for all? What's it going to take? $100 barrels of oil? $200? Will there even be oil left after 50 years? Dubya doesn't realize it, but he can't run his war machines on empty tanks and his so-called faith in God. So much for defending the nation in the future when we'll really need it.
Nevertheless, my apologies to everyone for flying off the handle, but let's face it. I'm growing incresingly impatient and hostile with people that bitch about the high price of gas, yet would rather fill up the tanks in their gas guzzling SUVs and pickups instead of trading them in for a more sensible vehicle. Meanwhile, I have to tighten my belt, make sacrifices, and pay the high price for their selfish gluttony? F*** them! They deserve the blame, too.
While it may seem paradoxical that even though we can't be sure if changes could lead to sudden warming or sudden cooling, pumping out tons and tons of greenhouse gasses into the air is basically performing a huge, uncontrolled experiment in global climate change.
It's not that hard to imagine why we can't really tell whether sudden warming or sudden cooling will be the result.
Imagine a pendulum. It's a ridiculously simplified model, but it provides the right basic mechanics to get the idea across. Set a pendulum swinging and it fluctuates naturally back and forth about an equilibrium. If you give the pendlum a hard push while it's swinging a couple of different things can happen: it can swing up high reach it's peack then swing back hard just as high in the opposite direction; alternatively you can push it so hard that it swings up over the top and just keeps going round and round in the same direction.
In essence we are giving the global climate a push. Is it a hard push? Hard enough to push past a tipping point, or swing back hard in the other direction? It's easy to enumerate all the significant forces acting on a pendulum, but if you give one a push it can still be hard to guess which way it will go. The number of different forces acting in rough balance to keep the global climate gently fluctuating is frighteningly large, and many we can currently only guess at. Which way will things go? Will forces dampen the pendulums swing or exaggerate it? What are all the different tipping points for all those different forces? These are very non-trivial questions.
The only really obvious thing is that introducing a new and unchecked driving force to a potentially unstable system is not especially clever. What exactly will happen is unclear, but surely it is sensible for us to seek our own equilibrium that suits us rather than letting nature find its own equilibrium that may not.
Jedidiah.
Craft Beer Programming T-shirts
"We'd have to wear gas masks when we went outside, because of air pollution."
0 5cavallo
You can thank American Government pollution laws for that not happening. Go to a major city in China; there, you'll DEFINITELY need gas masks to deal with pollution, especially near those "free enterprize" zones where pollution is not regulated. China has 7 of the world's most polluted cities. Proof: http://www.gasandoil.com/goc/news/nts40287.htm
Oh and recently, Exxon-Mobil Corporation announced that peak oil will happen in 5 years. Proof: http://www.thebulletin.org/article.php?art_ofn=mj
Also, for a good miniature end-of-the-world scenario that happened, go read up on Rapa Nui, aka Easter Island.
--- Grow a pair, liberals... stop letting the Republicans bully you!
Well, let's see... The amount of energy coming from the sun and from the radioactive decay in the earth is pretty much the same as it is today, for say 100 Million years. All during that time quite a bit of that energy has been stored by plants and microscopic critters and was deposited in the ocean floor..
We've been using that stored energy, releasing all of that carbon which is superbly good at reflecting infrared energy--which impacts the primary means for the cooling of the planet--radiation. It's proven by ice core samples that CO2 levels were fairly level for a long long time up until the 1800's, where concentration has grown almost exponentially. Even the oil giants will admit it in their studies!
We're using up gobs of energy that was stored up a long long time ago, which necessarily produces heat (except for energy derived from natural events which we have no control over, such as hydro, wind, geothermal, etc.--but most of our power comes from coal, oil and gas). Yearly consumption, by the way, is on the order of ~500 exajoules today. That's a buttload of energy, and if the earth can't get rid of it by radiating, it's just not gonna happen. If radiating ability is significantly impaired, we lose. Once it gets hot enough, water vapor will start to have much the same impact as the CO2. The cycle could literally run away and blow up in our faces, for all we know. Maybe it will, maybe it won't. I can't say, but many scientists have a pretty good idea of what will happen, but it's possible that they know what will happen about as well as anyone else... So, why stack all your chips and throw the ball into the roulette wheel without giving it a real good thought?
So, it's a two forked problem, we're pumping out tons of energy such that the planet has never experienced before, and we ARE impairing it's ability to radiate, as far as we can tell. History can't account for today, and for mankind--and we must tread cautiously because of that. It's true that there are climatic changes over the course of thousands of years, no argument there. But there were no humans driving their H2's around back then. A few degrees over the course of a couple hundred years are particularly worrying in the grand scheme of things, and sticking your head in the ground is the worst kind of solution!
Constitutional rights may be respected, repealed, or modified; but they must never be ignored.
So, wait....if it's not natural for this formerly "permafrost" peat bog to be melting, how is it that this peat moss was, at some point, able to grow in the first place?
Oh it's natural for peat moss to be able to grow there, given the right gloal climate. The question is more whether it is natural for humans to continue populating the areas we do in a global climate in which peat moss grows there. The earth and the global climate are, historically, remarkably resilient; humans, and other fauna, are not.
Jedidiah.
Craft Beer Programming T-shirts
If we do nothing as far as policy is concerned, the science tells us pretty clearly that things will keep getting more out of whack and faster.
The science says NOTHING conclusive concerning what part of global warming is natural and what part is due to human activity. Jury's still out on this one, at least to people who care about empiricism.
Without an answer to that question (and even with one) we really have no idea what, if anything, can be done to slow down warming. Everything in that area is pure guesswork and nobody knows if doing things like drastically reducing emissions will have any effect. We only have a single sample to work with, and a wrong guess won't become apparent for at least fifty years.
The question is, when do we decide to do something about it?
Perhaps when we know what part of climate change is natural and what part is artificial? And after we determine with some reasonable degree of certainty what methods can be used to slow it down - assuming that's the desirable outcome?
whatever we see at any given moment will be a small fraction of what we are already committed to.
That's true no matter what happens and what process is to blame. We've only got the one planet, which means we're "committed to" whatever the hell happens to it regardless.
At this point we are in big trouble
No, we aren't. The doomsayers cry out that the end is nigh, but so far humans have adapted remarkably well to changing climactic conditions. In fact, humans sans any real technology have managed to survive several much more radical climate changes - and without their numbers being endangered in any real way.
still lots of folks are coming up with irrational arguments for ignoring it.
Some folks ignore it, but a good many would like some more science along with an empirically sound approach, rather than frenzied hair-pulling, teeth-gnashing, and I-just-pulled-this-out-of-my-ass guesswork.
Max
My god carries a hammer. Your god died nailed to a tree. Any questions?
What irks me, really, is that while 'neo-cons,' for lack of a better stereotype, have been sneering at eco-sensitive groups and warnings regarding pollution, for apparently being wrong, they fail to realize that it was only these whistle blowers that caused the environmental laws and restrictions to come into place that have manages to slow(if not entirely stem) the major effects of pollution.
And for the record, oil is a limited resource that can and will be depleted if we continue to guzzle the stuff at the rate we do, and anyone who believes otherwise, well. Oil is naturally produced very, very slowly, and not in massive quantities. It took billions of years to build up the reserves that exist, and we've managed to deplete them in less than a century. If anyone actually believes that the earth is pumping out as much oil as the world is consuming on a daily basis, they need to go back to school, because that crap just isn't any kind of rational thought.
And yes, for the record, I do believe that man is a significant factor in global warming. The only scientists that believe otherwise happen to be sponsored by the industries who really want to hear good things for their businesses.
I also like to believe(hope) that there are some neo-cons who are at least willing to admit that introducing unnaturally large amounts of chemicals into the o-zone is obviously going to affect it in some way. Which is preferable, at least, to putting on the blinders and completely neglecting the planet's future based on presumptions that they cannot prove to be correct.
Reasonably, if there's even a small chance that we are causing global warming, then we should do everything we can to do slow or stem that cycle. Playing the denial game is only going to ensure that it happens.
How is the budget?
Subject to congress. "Neo-Con" scarcely describes that crowd. The just-signed transportation bill is full of billions in pork sponsored and demanded by reps and senators on both sides of the aisle.
Where are those nuclear WMD?
You mean the efforts we thought were farther along, in Saddam's pursuit thereof? That would be "we thought" as in, we and the intelligence agencies of a dozen other countries (including France, Germany, Russia, and so on). Of course, Saddam was also being lied to by his own scientists and thought he had things they hadn't even produced. But his behavior, including his need to WMD-posture against rival Iran, and his constant game playing with UN inspectors, sent very credible signals.
Where is the democracy over at Iraq
You must have missed the part where eight million Iraqis voted a few months back. Or the part where they're in the middle of drafting a consitution. You know - a constitution. The thing it took the US's founders until 1787 to get wrapped up. Years, not months. The Iraqis are moving along really well.
Why were we attack on 9/11
Because the US is the single greatest defender of democracy in the history of the world. And because in the preceding years, they saw terrorism work like a charm. It chased the US out of Beruit. It caused Clinton to tuck tail and leave Somalia to the warlords. It went unpunished as hundreds were killed in the Africa embassy bombings and the attack on the USS Cole. And, of course, the WTC had been attacked before, with every intention of knocking it down the first time, and that time they failed. Read the damn news.
Why the gag order on Sibel Edwards
Because detailed information about the intelligence provided to our military leadership is not something that we want to advertise. The people that are covered by that intelligence are the ones that continue to attack - or did you not notice London and Egypt last month? Telling those people what sort of communications we can tap, or how we gather that information is crazy.
Why a 2 front war when we have not caught Bin Ladin yet
Because we have the most powerful, best-trained military in the world, and can work on two things at once.
Why are several traitors being tolerated in the white house
Because you're making that BS up. If that's your standard, then also ask why half the democratic seniority on half a dozen committees in congress are "traitors."
Where are the anthrax manufactuers who spread it after 9/11?
Like most fairly clever criminals, hard to find.
Why is it, that we only lose shuttles during neo-cons times
Unbelievable. OK, how about this: because we fly them then. Why did the only Apollo astronauts to die do so while a democrat was running things? Um... maybe because that has nothing to do with it?
How is our national budget again
Recovering from a recession that started during the Clinton administration.
How is our economy
See above. And, it has added 4 million jobs since that recession bottomed out. It's also the strongest, most productive economy in the world. Unemployment is below historical averages. As an example, unemployment was higher during the Clinton administration. Trying to ignore stuff like that, or afraid to admit that there are such things as business cycles? In the meantime, we have incredibly low interest rates, the highest ever rate of home ownership, and more people working than ever before.
Neocons refuse to accept blame.
For what? Your list was nonsense, so you'll have to try again.
Don't disappoint your bird dog. Go to the range.
There are leaders who could do something about it (or at least said they would), like Al Gore; blame the voters for sneering at his nerdiness and voting for people who tell them they can have it all and not pay for it. Don't give up on the system, participate and make it work, it's the only hope we have.
You don't know that, either way. You have zip in empirical evidence to indicate that "we're fucked", however you define it.
We don't know for sure that we're fucked. But consider this analogy: There is a gun pointed at your head. It might be loaded. Are you going to take drastic steps to remove it, or are you going to play russian roulette on the grounds that "we don't know for sure that it's loaded".
My Karma: ran over your Dogma
StrawberryFrog
While the original list was plain silly, I have to laugh at this.
Because the US is the single greatest defender of democracy in the history of the world.
Given the history of the US in backing non-democratic governments that overthrow democratic but socialist governments, (nd remember that doesn't mean communist or want to become communist, lots of countries elect socialist governments from time to time, much of Europe for example.
Look at the brutal un-democratic regimes the US still backs. If someone from Saudi Arabia or Uzbekistan hates the US its unlikely to be because they hate it for its freedom and democracy but more likely because it backs a deeply unpopular regime (of course that is just one reason, there may be others rational and irrational).
We are all grateful for what the US did in WWII, but remember was against a democratic election there since the result would probably have been something it didn't want.
The US is no worse than most countries in the way it acts in its own interest, but it isn't really much better either. If you look at its history it isn't some great bastion of worldwide democracy and freedom, just self interested like everyone else.
To come vaguely back on topic, when the rest of the world sees a US reluctance to do anything about climate change, a lot of people see that same self-interest, although very short term, again. It seems to largely be US scientist (and a minority of them) who don't think humans are having an effect. Many of which work for US companies that give large donations to US politicians. This makes people pretty sceptical.
10 men are sailing in a whaler on a whale hunt. The boat, being an older boat made of wood, it leaks a little. But after sailing about for a few hours, many men begin to notice that the amount of water in the boat seems to have increased quite significantly, much more than what is usual or expected. What should the men do?
a) Take more measurements and get conclusive evidence that their boat is actually going to sink before they can make it back to shore.
OR
b) Start bailing.
---Technology will liberate us if it doesn't enslave us first.
> We'd have to wear gas masks when we went outside, because of air pollution.
Do you have any idea how many laws and regulations have been imposed to reduce air pollution during the last 40 years?
> We'd be out of oil (evidently it was all floating in the ocean).
There's only a finite amount of oil in the ground, and demand is still growing. You do the math.
> DDT was the scourge of the world.
Are you arguing that DDT is, in fact, safe?
> And, yes, the Coming Ice Age would freeze us all.
Was there ever a consensus among scientists that and Ice Age was imminent? I hear this all the time from global warming deniers, but I don't actually recall hearing it way back when. (There was a big flap over a possible nuclear winter, though.)
> I say again: Global Warning? Meh. Take a number, you'll find the dispenser next to the Y2k countdown calendar.
So, just because one problem was overblown, we can safely ignore all the others?
Sheesh, evil *and* a jerk. -- Jade
Why a 2 front war when we have not caught Bin Ladin yet.
Because we have the most powerful, best-trained military in the world, and can work on two things at once.
Yeah, you lot are so good that you regularly shoot your own side. Not to mention that the US army is rediculously trigger happy too.
You might have the bigest army in the world, but that sure as hell doesn't make it the best. Training is what counts, and from what I see on the news (including abc) it appears that some parts of the US Army/Navy require more of that.
Because the US is the single greatest defender of democracy in the history of the world.
... It caused Clinton to tuck tail and leave Somalia to the warlords.
I hope this is meant as irony, because otherwise it's kind of sad.
Although the US is indeed one of the biggest countries that occasionally comes to the defense of democracy, it's also one of the biggest countries to overthrow democratically elected governments and replace them with a pro-US dictator whenever that fits better into their goals.
Iran, for example, had a democratically elected government before the US replaced it with the Shah in 1954. You may also have heard of Pinochet in Chili, and of all the mess the US was involved in Central America.
And because in the preceding years, they saw terrorism work like a charm.
I don't think that was because of terrorism, but rather because the US forces were unable to deal with guerilla's. I can't remember any terrorist strike against a US civilian target that had anything to do with Somalia.
And about those WMDs, it was the US that claimed to have proof, not the other way around. So far, that proof seems to have been a complete and utter fabrication.
mcv.
Here is what I am hearing:
"The world is experiencing global warming!"
"Are you sure?"
"Yup, here is a science that proves that 400,000 years ago, it was cooler."
"Wait, I thought there was an ice age that we are still coming out of."
"That's true, but people aren't worrying enough about pollution so we are trying to emphasize that the impact is global. So far, the only science that we have that proves that is that it is warmer. Oil is bad."
It is a known and observed fact that lightning activity goes up as temperature rises,
That must be based on faulty assumptions.
If Google really cared they would fix Android Chrome to reflow text, instead of discriminating
While no individual scientist has the time to question every single theory in existence, a real scientist will _accept_ that any given theory _can_ be questioned. No matter how old, how established, how popular, or how well it fits his political party's doctrine.
There's a reason why even established stuff like gravity is called a "theory" and never renamed to "fact". It's always just a "theory" (ok, in the scientific sense, not in the common usage of "just a theory", which is more like "hypothesis".) It can _always_ be a candidate to be better understood, revised or outright discarded.
The moment one theory is put on a pedestal, it's suddenly taken as a 100% finished and definitive fact, that noone should ever question, it stopped being science.
So when I see a whole bloody thread and a whole bloody disertation aimed openly at discrediting anyone who dares question the sacred truth, and based on such fine fallacies as:
- Ad Hominem and more speciffically a very verbose case of Poisoning The Well (The _whole_ purpose of the whole GALLANT vs GOOFUS thing is to ridicule and undermine the credibility of GALLANT, instead of whether his theories might or might not be right. So most of the other fallacies are just there to serve this one.)
- Appeal to Numbers (More of us believe X instead of Y, so X must be true. Or conversely, don't even consider Y, since it doesn't have a "consensus".)
- Appeal to Motive (Let's divert the question from whether a theory is right to the possibility that anyone supporting it _might_ have some hidden motives.)
- Argumentum ad Lazarum and other forms of Appeal to Emotion to paint GOOFUS as _likeable_, as the only proof needed that his is the right theory. (Surely the poor guy who earns less and doesn't wear a suit must be right, because he's the one your average slashdotter can sympathise more.)
- Appeal To Spite and/or Association Fallacy (Surely the _only_ ones supporting those theories are those evil conservatives/oil cartels/whatever supporting those theories. And because they're evil, anyone or any theory associated with them is automatically evil and discredited.)
(You can also add the Begging The Question to the last one, since there's a bit of circular logic and assuming that you already know they're evil, in classifying them as evil in the first place.)
- Appeal To Fear (While not directly a theme of the GOOFUS vs GALLANT story, it _is_ the _main_ theme waved around in this whole using ecology as political capital. If you don't imediately stop believing all else and do as we say, we're all doomed!)
And so on, and so forth.
Sorry, that is _not_ science. It's politics and religion, but science it sure as heck ain't. I don't know which is the correct theory there, but it sure as heck ain't decided by such GALLANT-vs-GOOFUS Poisoning the Well rhetoric.
(Which of course, doesn't invalidate the fact that global warming might (or might not) be real. Like anything which is just a string of fallacies, it really doesn't prove anything. It does, however, disgust me profoundly.)
A polar bear is a cartesian bear after a coordinate transform.
I hope this is meant as irony, because otherwise it's kind of sad
No, sad would be the lack of democracy in Japan, or Germany. Or throughout eastern Europe. Happily that's not the case. Happier still will be democracy throughout the Middle East - not just in Israel, and partially in Egypt. That, of course, is the whole damn point of sticking it out in Iraq. Even the Saudis just started having municipal elections... these things take time.
don't think that was because of terrorism, but rather because the US forces were unable to deal with guerilla's
The last straw was the shoot-down of the Blackhawk in Mogadishu. If you'll recall, Somalia was (and still is) a hot spot for al Qaeda supported and trained insurgency. Having been deprived of their cozy little spot in Afghanistan, they're looking to set up shop in other chaotic places. That Clinton didn't send in major troops to make that problem go away right after the embassy bombings is a damn shame, really. But the bad news is that the locals and the al Qaeda people there spurring them on remain convinced that shooting up a helicopter crew was all it took to run the US out of the peacekeeping mission there. In practical effect, that's true. Just like blowing up some barracks in Beruit would be seen by the people that did it as all it took to remove our Marine presence from that trouble spot. That's the conclusion they reasonably drew, and is exactly the sort of thing that has people like Zarqawi convinced that enough car bombs in Iraq will eventually get him that country as a playground for the mysoginistic, medeival-minded theocratic thugocracy that he'd like to see running the entire Middle East.
it's also one of the biggest countries to overthrow democratically elected governments and replace them with a pro-US dictator whenever that fits better into their goals.
Help me out, here, with some post-Cold War examples. That's crucial, because stopping the tyranny of the Soviet Union was paramount. Ask the folks living in Romania, Hungary, Bulgaria, Poland etc what they think of the results of playing chess with the Soviets in their proxy/puppet conflicts in places like Central America and Asia over the last decades of their influence. It's over now. The true socialist crazies (say, Chavez in Venezuela) are now having to get support from immitation communists (like China) that are really just totalitarian-run emerging capitalist economies that won't tolerate (as a population) that crap for much longer. I'm amused that people like Chavez think China's support is idealogical.
Don't disappoint your bird dog. Go to the range.
Those in turn existed because some people (e.g., Galileo) dared question the existing model...
As the OP said, GALLANT paints the scientific consensus as being entirely political in nature and enjoys comparing himself to Galileo.
They laughed at Galileo, they laughed at Einstein... but they also laughed at Bozo the Clown. To compare fake science bought and paid for by folks with a huge monetary stake in the results to the work of Galileo or Einstein is an insult to every scientist who ever honestly questioned dogma.
--grendel drago
Laws do not persuade just because they threaten. --Seneca
Siberian citizens: Ya, I am sinkink dat I like za balmy weather.
No, are you crazy? Hot weather in Siberia is *AWFUL*. With half the land being swamps, the area is literally crawling with mosquitoes, black flies, and horse flies. I'm not exaggerating! Your clothes look gray because of all the blood-feeding insects crawling over them. It's tolerable if the weather is cool, since several layers of clothing is the only sure way to avoid bites (deet gets quickly rubbed off by bugs hitting your body). When it's hot, not only are you crawling with bugs, you're also sweating and developing a heat stroke.
Believe me, late fall or early spring is the best time in Siberia, not summer, and everyone hates "za balmy weather."
(Yes, I've lived there).
If you open yourself to the foo, You and foo become one.
Yes, because hey, it wouldn't be right if a small percentage of people in Africa possibly got cancer instead of the 2.7 million people dying every year from malaria. Then again, it's not really toxic to humans anyway (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/DDT).
Oh, come on. The whole point is that the most vocal critics of climate change are paid off by companies with a huge stake in it. You can manufacture fantasies of power-mad ivory-tower cranks in white coats trying to destroy capitalism (If you don't imediately stop believing all else and do as we say, we're all doomed!), but the fact remains that reputable scientists don't have to be paid off by lobbyists to come to a conclusion. Those are not real scientists.
And you're just trying to muddy the waters, make it so that a casual reader of this discussion will conclude that there are crazy zealots on both sides and, gee, maybe we shouldn't do anything because science is divided on the issue. Which it ain't.
--grendel drago
Laws do not persuade just because they threaten. --Seneca
This is polemical nonsense. If science says nothing colclusive about this matter it says nothing conclusive about anything.
This is the only planet in the known universe that supports advanced life, not a court of law. Even if the "beyond a reasonable doubt" criterion were not satisfied (a threshhold which was passed some time ago) the criterion is wrong; greenhouse gases are not innocent until proven guilty.
If you must use legalistic arguments, surely the presumption of innocence goes to the undisturbed atmosphere, not to the pollutant.
The best available evidence is overwhelming that most or even all of the observed warming is caused by humans, that most of past warming and cooling episodes were related to natural variation in greenhouse gases, and that the warming will continue to accelerate. The predictions based on this understanding that were made around 1990 are on track.
If you want to call this frenzied hair-pulling, teeth-gnashing, and I-just-pulled-this-out-of-my-ass guesswork I guess you can do that, but I think it's an empirically sound approach to call you uninformed on this matter, to say the least.
mt
... on a screenplay by a guy who has "agenda" written on his forehead.
"Win treats sysadmins better than users. Mac treats users better than sysadmins. Linux treats everyone like sysadmins."
it takes a truly sick man to quote crichton about environmentalism
he hates environmentalists with a passion that rivels phelps' hatred of homosexuals, and is about as pleasant to look at.
shaolin punk, activist post-industrial
"Gee, even if there were a 'Global Warming', it just means we can go on destroying American peat bogs, because there are new ones thawing off in Siberia."
Lars T.
To the guy who modded me down from perfect to terrible Karma - Apple haters still suck
I'm by no means claiming that it inevitably happens. I'm sure there are very honest scientists out there (the vast majority) who honestly believe in the work their doing and are trying to do it in the very best way possible.
n g+discredited. I'm not trying to start a flamefest here because it's obvious there are people in both camps who feel extremely strong about the subject. I'm just saying that if you look hard enough you'll find something to both prove and disprove a theory. Human nature is going to cause us to apply less credence to something that goes against our beliefs than one that supports it.
This is strictly conjecture on my part, so take it for what it's worth. Scientists are human (or so I'm lead to believe) and as such are lead to try to prove or disprove something they believe in. That's a good part of science to begin with. I've always understood that it starts with a hypothesis and you work from there. Nobody likes to be wrong and will work vehemently to prove themselves right.
Much like the person that spends a lot of time browsing the medical symptoms websites, eventually they'll find a symptom of some largely fatal and rare disease and panic themselves into a fit over it. If you look long enough you'll find some sort of evidence to prove or disprove what you believe in.
It's very easy to hit the web and find information that proves the global warming theory. That's an accepted theory. So is the ability to search the web and find information that discredits that theory http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&q=global+warmi
Personally I'm up in the air about the whole thing. I don't know enough about the situation to make an informed decision so I try to look at all sides of it. On the other hand, being a cynical human myself I'm certainly not going to take somebody's word for it just because they're a learned professional--especially when other people/groups are offering contradictory information as well.
The world according to SComps
First, take a moment to consider the context in which I was replying. It was an ill-considered troll feeding moment, and the GP's rhetorical silliness (traitors in the White House, neo-cons destroying space shuttles, our horrible economy, blah blah) got what the commentor wanted - an off-the-cuff jab back. You know, when you reply too briefly and without enough context, the... um... Anonymous Coward Trolling Terrorists win... or something like that.
Seriously, you must know by this point in your life that pretty much nothing is that simple.
Clearly. And the problem with clowns like the guy I was replying to is that you either need to construct a 1000-word history lesson (that he won't even read anyway), and explain the underlying concepts that are worth defending while putting historical compromises/mis-steps in perspective, or you just put in a rhetorical jab that may or may not register at the level at which that person is communicating. I know it's vastly more complicated than that, but actually I do find the basic reality pretty simple. There is no greater force for democracy and liberty, right now, this minute, than the U.S., warts and all. We do now, and have always had to hold our noses while dealing with certain other societies/individuals.
Do I find it frustrating that the Saudis are who they are? Yup. But you'll notice they've managed to avoid seeming bristly and overtly hostile, as a regime, as opposed to those charming Taliban folks, or Saddam, or North Korea, or the delightfully late Yassir Arafat, etc. There are definately strong currents in Saudi Arabia that would like to see both us AND the house of Saud swirl the toilet. That puts the Saudis in that famous enemy-of-my-enemy category. Too late, of course - they could have headed off the bin Laden family's favorite son a long time ago, and didn't. I really don't think they expected him and his followers to become as malignant as they have become.
The idea that anybody could, at this point, still attempt to defend this administration is bizarre enough
I've got all sorts of bones to pick with the administration. But they are the administration. We truly, acually, really are dealing with issues that could make the economic and social impact of 9/11 look trivial, and I have an interest in at least attempting to squash the "traitors in the White House" silliness because that's the stuff that gets circulated more than, say, enormous AIDS support to Africa, or pressuring Syria to get out of Lebannon's internal politics, or continuing to keep China from breathing down Taiwan's neck any more than they already do. Etc.
I loathe Bush's take on most matters related to the sciences (though I like much of the current NASA redirection - but that's another, and mixed discussion). I find him earnest, but definitely a product of his generation, and too much under the sway of the religious circles that he grabbed hold of while shaking off his youthful over-partying excesses. I don't think he wants babies and old people to starve, and I don't think he likes poison water, or wants to see Iran burn, baby burn. But he's the C-in-C, and dealing with an unbelievably difficult moment in history, and there are people out here just saying some damn silly stuff.
I'm not too worried that you've lost all respect for me, since I'll just keep posting my thoughts, however provoked they may be, sometimes, by flamebating nitwits. One of these days I'll learn not to fall for that stuff, or will decide to invest the extra time in making my comments in context even when it will be wasted on the actual person to whom I'm replying. I guess I'm still rather shocked that anybody bothers to read anything I say, so it's not always in the forefront of my mind to ask myself what a wider audience might conclude about me, based on a barbed, late-night exchange made while watching Conan O'Brien and scratching at six new no-doubt global-warming-caused mosquito bites.
Don't disappoint your bird dog. Go to the range.
You're predicting unsustainability on the premise that technology will never progress beyond what we have today - like all alarmists. As if the status quo this moment is all we're ever going to achieve, despite the fact that the entirety of human history contradicts this notion.
In order for technology to progress, someone has to realize it needs to change.
But you claim everybody who promotes change is an alarmist.
You're caught in a loop of illogic.
It's this pesky little problem called national borders. Many, if not most of them haven't been in place for hundreds of years, some only tens.
Everything I've heard about global warming suggests changes in sea level, which hits hardest on low-lying areas, with Bangladesh being frequently mentioned. So what happens when part of Bangladesh becomes the Indian Ocean, and a significant part of the rest has flooding problems? What happens when portions of northern European countries decide they'd rather be in the North Sea? How about when Florida seacoast becomes Atlantic and Gulf shallows?
Past tipping points were accompanied by extinctions of various sizes. I suspect humans WILL adapt just fine.
But I doubt our societies will. I expect there would be a lot of social strife, and more deaths would be caused by other humans than by climatic problems.
The living have better things to do than to continue hating the dead.
The science says NOTHING conclusive concerning what part of global warming is natural and what part is due to human activity. Jury's still out on this one, at least to people who care about empiricism.
Almost but not quite correct. The general consensus among the scientific crowd is that roughly 50% of the increase so far is due to human activity. The other 50% would have happened anyway.
Now, this is admittedly only accurate to about 2 or 3 bits, depending on the model, and this isn't what you'd call engineering accuracy. When they say 50%, it could be 40% or 60% and still be within the error bars. They're hard at work adding another bit or two, but it's slow going.
Two bits is slightly different from nothing.
Hell, I have lots of fields in my data structures that are only one bit. Very few programmers would consider that "nothing". Sometimes one bit is all you need to get the job done right.
Those who do study history are doomed to stand helplessly by while everyone else repeats it.
1. cease driving an internal combustion vehicle.
Up until I had a bad accident my primary transportation was a bike.
2. shutting off power to your residence.
Not needed if you generate the power you use. Going Off the grid is being done more and more.
4. growing your own food and processing it.
Yeap, I love to garden and I like to can and otherwise preserve what I grow.
6. avoiding the use of anything that is made with plastic.
Again not needed. Plastics were originally made from plant material. Cellophane was made from the cellulose of plants. Hemp, aka marijuana and probably the most industrially versatile plant is a good plant source. On his Iron Mountain estate Henry Ford not only built an automobile using hemp for some of the material but was also powered by fuel made from hemp. Rudulph Diesel designed his diesel engine to run on most any oil made from plants. Both alcohol and biodiesel are carbon neutral and both can be made from hemp. Actually the reason hemp was made "illegal" via the Marijuana Tax Act of 1937 was because it posed a serious threat to some rich and powerful people. When congress was "debating" the act Dr James Woodward who was both a doctor and an attorney testified on behalf of the AMA. He said all of the testimony in support of the act was nothing more than tabloid sensationalism and that it could potentionally be a powerful medicine. During WWII hemp was so important the US government made the movie Hemp for Victory in 1942 in an effort to get farmers to grow it.
FalconShould there be a Law?
A lot of people like to drum up arguments that the world is a few thosand years old. They are wrong. They do not deserve equal time to inflict their superstition on children. They do not deserve their own "research grants".
In the case of climate change, there is a spectrum of scientific opinion, and the exact middle of it is being cast as "one side", while there is a pile of propaganda with a couple of credentialed paid advocates, pretty much outside the spectrum of scientific opinion or at best very much at the fringe (I'm being generous here) that is cast in the press as "the other side".
Whenever people see these as two contending scientific opinions rather than a political opinion arrayed against the great mass of scientific reseach, the propagandists win.
Of course junk science cuts both ways, but in this case the junk is on the side that says there isn't a problem, not on the side that says it is.
That all said, I regret my use of the word "unanimous", and I regret that parent picked up on it. I make no claim that all the membership of the scientific bodies I mentioned supported their positions. Note these are in some cases huge groups, and an occasional bad apple will stray in. The relevant bodies themselves are all agreed (a sort of unanimity), but it goes too far to say or imply that their memberships are *unanimous* about whether IPCC fairly represents the science.
That said, the not-quite-unanimous vast majority of scientists in relevant fields would agree that IPCC does a good job of summarizing the scientific evidence. It is a thorough, disciplined and responsible presentation of the center of informed scientific opinion on these matters.
mt
What you're seeing in this flood of posts is evidence of what's called "new conservativism" or "neo-conservativism" here in the states. It actually started some 20 years ago, with the election of Reagan, but grew and blossomed throughout the years of the Gingrich ascendancy and the "contract with America". The "new" part is really a change in the tactical approach to argument and disagreement. The tactic (Rove is a good example of how to use it well) is now to wrap your flag around you and immediately discredit/bash/hack apart anything you don't like as commie atheist liberal tree-hugging unethical anti-american immoral hippie sputum. Once the other side has been successfully characterized as undeserving of respect, nothing they say can be taken seriously, by anyone. It's very effective, too. Ordinarily, to stand taller than others you have to straighten your back. Using this method, you can just bash others until they get smaller. It's much less demanding and oh so much more fun. I'm not suggesting that it's right, only that this is "the way it is".
As for why most Americans aren't terribly worried, given hurricanes, drought and the like -- it has to do as much with geography than anything else. We've got, here in the southern half of North America, more rich and varied kinds of terrain and weather than almost anywhere else on the planet. We have HUGE coastlines. If you don't like the weather where you are, you can move someplace that's more to your liking. It may oversimplify it a bit, but that's my sense of it.
As for your last paragraph -- Well, we make our own common sense, here. If we wanted western european common sense, we'd never have left. Incidentally, I'm only the third generation of my family that's been born here, and we came from Minsk, where they also lack the western european flavor of common sense.
Anyhow, I hope that helps you sort it all out. What you may be missing, though, is that while there are a lot of naysaying posts (from Americans) about global warming, there are also a great many posts that are not so dismissive of the idea. Slashdot, in my experience, seems to get the attention of more of us commie atheist liberal tree-hugging unethical anti-american immoral hippie sputa than the neo-conservatives, but I can't really quantify it.
Have a nice day!
.. pa-ra-bo-la, pa-ra-bo-la, 2 pi R, 2 pi R, where's your latus rectum, where's your latus rectum, 2 pi R
And short-sighted profit motive has never led to negative consequences?
Instead, if we had a good idea of the external cost (ie, the cost imposed on everyone else) of producing one extra ton of CO2, then we could impose that cost (as a tax) on the producer. And distribute the payment appropriately to those effected by global warming. But the science isn't to that point.
So you acknowledge that there is a cost associated with GW? But then you say we don't know enough to try and correct for the "inefficiency" that comes from not accounting for the cost properly... But isn't it worse to do nothing instead of trying to maximize efficiency based on the best available knowledge? "Perfect" is the enemy of better, after all.
Human genome = 3 billion base pairs = 6 GBit. Windows + Office = 20 Gbit. Which is more impressive?