Slashdot Mirror
Alaskan Village Sues Over Global Warming
hightower_40 writes to mention that a small Alaskan village has sued two dozen oil, power, and coal companies, blaming them for contributing to global warming. "Sea ice traditionally protected the community, whose economy is based in part on salmon fishing plus subsistence hunting of whale, seal, walrus, and caribou. But sea ice that forms later and melts sooner because of higher temperatures has left the community unprotected from fall and winter storm waves and surges that lash coastal areas."
IANAL. It would seem to me that if you are going to sue someone for causing you harm, you would need to sue everyone involved. In this case, that would mean sueing almost everyone in the world. It's not fair to target one small group just because they have money. IANAL.
I see the glass as full with a FoS of 2.
Socialize costs.
It's sad to see this kind of thing going forward because there are too many forces arrayed against it for it to actually be successful.
http://www.maxineudall.com/2010/02/should-economists-be-sued-for-malpractice.html
I do love the part where they're complaining that global warming is keeping them from hunting "whale, seal, walrus, and caribou". Maybe Leonardo diCaprio should make a movie about that!
What I'm listening to now on Pandora...
than anything else. I live in Alaska and can tell you the driving force behind this is actually "The Center on Race, Poverty & the Environment and the Native American Rights Fund -- plus six law firms." The natives in the village use gas-powered vehicles for transportation and (generator) electricity for their homes, suing the people who provide the source for those items.
Shoot, why don't we all climb on board. Oh, wait - I drive a car to work and use natural gas to heat my home, plus electricity to power my net activities...
Yes it is http://www.dailytech.com/Temperature+Monitors+Report+Worldwide+Global+Cooling/article10866.htm The same idiots were screaming ice age in the late 70's to early 80's. Further they are using it to proposed government initiatives at a global level. Good bye freedoms and even the pittance of accountability we have now have once the UN (majority tyrants) get control. This is junk science at its worst.
Of course. I always value the scientific opinion of the founder of The Weather Channel over the consensus of hundreds of climate scientists.
What a fool believes, he sees, no wise man has the power to reason away.
If anything is substantially responsible for increasing the earth's temperature, it's that nuclear-reactor-in-the-sky.
I am not a lawyer (yet), but it looks as if the villagers are going to have a hell of a time proving duty and proximate causation. I wonder if this case is anything more than a publicity stunt.
Viral software licensing is not freedom, it is in fact GNU/Socialism.
Alternately, they could break out a book on statistics and explain how temperature is noisy at that scale.
Sheesh, evil *and* a jerk. -- Jade
Hey, look at me! I've got a few years worth of data! Now I can make wide reaching conclusions about the work of hundreds of scientists!
Temperature changes are well understood to happen more gradually than a few years. If the next decade would show cooling that still wouldn't mean anything about the long term trend. Short term reversals of some trends can and do happen. A volcano spewed sulfur into the atmosphere? Solar output decreased very slightly? And so on...
This doesn't invalidate the long term warming trend and the science behind global warming, at all.
It takes a man to suffer ignorance and smile
Be yourself no matter what they say
Bullshit. Global warming is happening. The facts (i.e. temperature readings) show it is. The question is whether the warming is normal, man-made or some combination of both. No, the melted ice caps have not reformed. Take a look at Kilimanjaro, Greenland and the fact there may be a Northwest Passage through the polar ice.
2) If drilling were allowed in Alaska and other locations, the price of oil would come down, jobs would be created, there would be more wealth in the economy, we would not be supporting the UAE.
Double bullshit. The same thing was said when oil drilling was first introducted in Alaska. Know what happened to oil prices? Nothing. Know why? Because the bulk of the oil had high sulphur content and so was shipped to Japan where their environmental laws were more lax than ours were at the time. Very little went to the U.S.
Yes, some jobs would be created but in the grand scheme of things, not enough to make up for the staggering losses to manufacturing jobs that have been experienced in the last ten years, let alone since the Carter administration.
As far as wealth, the vast majority of wealth would go to three populations: the oil companies themselves, the heads of those oil companies and the shareholders of the companies. A small amount would go to the Treasury but certainly not enough to change people's lives, especially with all the tax breaks and credits that oil companies still receive despite there being no need for the breaks.
Ok, so we don't support the UAE. How about Saudi Arabia where they wanted to flog a woman because she was with an unrelated man even though she had been gang raped?
3) No matter how much you dislike an entity, frivolous lawsuits are harmful to everyone.
Finally, something we can agree on though with one minor quibble. The only ones not harmed are the attorneys. They get paid either way.
We will bankrupt ourselves in the vain search for absolute security. -- Dwight D. Eisenhower
Will be created by clearcutting whole tree farms to make the paper a case of this magnitude requires.
You answered: Not in the absence of competence to interpret it. Then you say: Meanwhile both poles are melting faster than anyone feared. What TFA I linked says: Over the past year, anecdotal evidence for a cooling planet has exploded. China has its coldest winter in 100 years. Baghdad sees its first snow in all recorded history. North America has the most snowcover in 50 years, with places like Wisconsin the highest since record-keeping began. Record levels of Antarctic sea ice, record cold in Minnesota, Texas, Florida, Mexico, Australia, Iran, Greece, South Africa, Greenland, Argentina, Chile -- the list goes on and on. What the Goddard Space Flight Center shows: While recent studies have shown that on the whole Arctic sea ice has decreased since the late 1970s, satellite records of sea ice around Antarctica reveal an overall increase in the southern hemisphere ice over the same period. Of course, it wouldn't be fair to bring up the opposing argument (from 2003): Australian scientists yesterday revealed new evidence of global warming, suggesting that sea ice around Antarctica had shrunk 20% in the past 50 years. So if decreasing sea ice proves global warming, wouldn't increasing sea ice DISprove global warming? I mean, I am not a climatologist and all, but I am a thinker.
I'm not saying that the climate didn't change or isn't changing. It is always changing. I'm saying that it is natural, not man made and that the "hockey stick" predictions of future climate models were dead wrong.
There is no "I disagree" mod for a reason. Flamebait, Troll, and Overrated are not substitutes.
That's called an ad hominem attack, in case you didn't know.
"attack the group"
I just pointed out that you were linking to an Exxon-funded front-group, so people can evaluate what they are seeing.
The simple facts that elude everyone on each side of this argument (regardless of which side is correct) are:
It does baffle me that instead of looking at the other valid reasons (and I listed only a few that quickly came to mind) people dismiss this "issue" because it is possibly targeting the wrong problem created by the issue. Lowering emissions is still just as relevant simply to maintain a clean, properly balanced atmosphere... anyone remember SanFran a few decades ago? It is obvious we can make a difference in our environment - negative or positive - but it is up to us to choose - and pretending CO2 and CO emissions aren't a problem simply because they may not cause global warming; when we know they do cause various other health and environmental problems is not the step in the right direction.
StarTrekPhase2 - The Five Year Mission Continues!
There is no "I disagree" mod for a reason. Flamebait, Troll, and Overrated are not substitutes.
Actually, I think readers deserve to know that a site offering what they purport to be a scholarly and independent analysis of science is actually funded by a corporation with an interest in distorting the facts. Especially when it turns out that the analysis offered by that site is contradicted by the scientific community.
"Doubt is our product" was the strategy used by the tobacco companies to pollute public understanding of the science about cancer. More than 100 million people have been killed by tobacco.
Now the oil and coal companies are using the same strategy - even some of the the same people and PR firms - to try to keep people from understanding what is happening with global warming.
So I think it IS important for people to know who is spreading this stuff, and why.
>That's why it's called climate change
So, basically more of the same that's been happening since before humanity even existed?
Spare me.
Oh, you think $1e6 per capita is too much? Wait until you see the claims of people with eroding property in California, Florida, and New York in a few years. I'm not saying the lawsuit is just or winnable, but I'll bet it is the first of many larger ones to come.
But how much of the change is anthropomorphic?
Is climate change driven by solar activity or CO2 levels or other or all?
Is humanity responsible for an appreciable amount of the CO2?
At one point I thought hurricanes were going to kill us all and we were blaming global warming. The last two years have been very quiet... You should not extrapolate noisy data.
These effects where noticed, many hypothesis was bantered around,and the media reported what they read on the day.
SOme people thought there would be cloaud cover, and therefore less heat on the earth, some believed the heat would be absorbed. both would create significant climate change.
As time marched on, more and more data was collected, many ideas were discarded.
Now we have gone from a split, to a consensus. It is working exactly like science should, data is collected, tested, Theories get refined, or discarded.
Bearing in mine the 'global warming' i.e. climate change doesn't mean everything stays the same, it's just a few degree's warmer. It means the flow of the Ocean will change; which can radically change the overall climate.
Being skeptical is fine, as long as it's balanced by studies.
The Kruger Dunning explains most post on
1) Global Warming is untrue. (most of those melted ice caps have reformed, no real data beyond the normal climatic cycle, etc.)
Huh? You are saying that because it hasn't been proven, then it isn't true. That's just stupid. Even the "global warming sceptics" have a consensus that the average temperature is increasing. I get handed radical right stuff by coworkers all the time, and I actually manage to read more of it than they do. Most global warming nay-sayers are really nay-saying the contribution by man, or CO2, or whatever, and the number of people that say "Here is proof that the world is getting colder" is roughly 0, and the number of people saying "here is proof the world is the same temperature" seems to be about 5% of the anti-global warming nuts. All the rest are "we don't know, so it can't be true" or "it is true, but we didn't cause it" or "it is true, but it isn't going to be a problem". Most documents I've seen "proving" global warming doesn't exist really end up being personal attacks on Al Gore or something else like that, and contain absolutely zero content about what is happening.
2) If drilling were allowed in Alaska and other locations, the price of oil would come down, jobs would be created, there would be more wealth in the economy, we would not be supporting the UAE.
Drilling is allowed in Alaska. How are you oil prices doing right now? There is an area that was deemed to be protected land about 100 years ago with zero proven oil reserves which it is suspected holds oil. There are some arguemnts over how much the protections should cover or whether to find out how much is there before determining what to do about the protections. And even if we went there and started extracting it now, it would be years before a pipeline was finished to connect it with the existing Alaska Pipeline. So, for your oil prices next year, ANWR has nothing to do with them. Any statements to the contrary are lies.
3) No matter how much you dislike an entity, frivolous lawsuits are harmful to everyone.
What's frivilous about it? If they can prove in court that global warming exists, is caused by CO2, and the defendants contributed CO2 to the atmosphere knowing that it could or would cause problems, they should win. This is the perfect example of Libertarian pollution controls. Someone gets harmed by pollution, so they sue. Keep the government out of environmental regulations and let the free market sort it out. If you don't like this, then it is a great example of how Libertaniranism is doomed to failure. I point this out because so many people that I've seen against this suit also say things that make them appear to be Libertarian.
Learn to love Alaska
Humans live better, longer and with less health issues when breathing a nitrogen/oxygen atmosphere - unpolluted with CO emissions and such other byproducts (regardless of which are possible causes of global warming)
Did you mean "unpolluted by CO2 emissions"? Because I don't want to breathe much carbon monoxide either. (And, fortunately, I don't.)If you did, though, please consider! The Earth's atmosphere already has billions of tons of carbon dioxide. Human emissions have increased this some, and this increase may or may not be Bad and Cause Global Warming, but calling CO2 "pollution" is like calling the ocean "polluted with salt".
CO2 is there. Naturally. In far, far greater quantities than Man ever put there.
The World Wide Web is dying. Soon, we shall have only the Internet.
Consensus != science...and even if it were, it's hardly as universal as Algore and his Grünsturmabteilung would have you believe.
20 January 2017: the End of an Error.
they aren't living in igloos. They have rifles, snowmobiles, 4x4s, satellite tv, etc.
Kevin Smith on Prince
20 January 2017: the End of an Error.
See also: Brilliant plan by Democrats, announced today, to tax the profits of the evil oil companies.
.sig.
Quite frankly, if I were an oil company, and had politicians getting elected promising to ram a pitchfork up my ass, all the while they claim they're gonna decimate oil with alternative fuels, I'd be dragging ass too in constructing new oil pipelines, infrastructure, refineries, and the like, when, if said politicians have their way, much of that new stuff'll be useless in a few years as oil use decreases and thus you cannot recoup your billions.
Screw that government and the people that elect it. Raise prices!
Do not mark this flamebait. This is a serious analysis. That it upsets you, well, read my
(-1: Post disagrees with my already-settled worldview) is not a valid mod option.
Al Gore is the chairman of Generation Investment Management, a company that sells carbon offsets (in particular, he buys his carbon offsets from his company. Does that make him biased as well?
A scientific consensus describes, not proscribes, the accumulated data & scientific theories. Read that again; descriptive, not proscriptive. Denying a consensus with nothing more than bluster and ad hominem retorts is a blatant denial of science. Provide relevant & complete evidence or you are no better than the creationists.
Cultures don't have a right to live. People have a right to live.
If your culture becomes unviable, you move on. It's not the rest of the planet's job to help you to live like a carbon copy of your father. We find this self evident with business models, but cultures evoke silly emotional reactions.
My Sig: SEGV
People have a right to be free from the unwanted impact of other people. I don't have a right to hit you in the face, or pollute your land, or fuck up the atmosphere we all breath. Destroying someone's culture impacts them personally, in a way that is not right or just.
- None can love freedom heartily, but good men; the rest love not freedom, but license. -- John Milton
What a fool believes, he sees, no wise man has the power to reason away.
"Destroying someone's culture impacts them personally, in a way that is not right or just."
I'm sorry, culture is a function of the people who create it, so unless you're going to fabricate some great genocide here, the culture isn't destroyed at all, just altered.
Hyperbole like yours is for weak ass arguments.
I knew the second I had the audacity to ask tough questions about Gore that his acolytes would mod me down.
Of course, they know what the answers to the questions I asked are, and would hope to see me modded off the plant in order to avoid answering them.
That's called an ad hominem attack, in case you didn't know.
From your link"An Ad Hominem is a general category of fallacies in which a claim or argument is rejected on the basis of some irrelevant fact about the author of or the person presenting the claim or argument."
I'd say the fact the entity making the claims about global warming is funded by an oil company is pretty damn relevant.
I stole this Sig
Right... that's what they all say when reproducing the experiments fails to verify that data you wanted us to ignore. Oh, you haven't reproduced the experiments? Wow, so you're saying their experiment is junk only because of who paid to have it done? Well then... classic ad hominem.
"The Speed at which it's changing is the problem. What has happened over 100 years would normally have taken 10s of thousands of years."
I guess it is good that we had this cooling period then because according to the article the cooling was "a value large enough to wipe out most of the warming recorded over the past 100 years."
JusTech'n - Where Technology comes home
He never claimed it was, you made that strawman. What the GP DID claim was that if you are in a position where you are unable to comprehend the actual science ( as most people probably are ) then it is more rational to trust a vast majority of climate scientists, peer reviewed articles in scientific journals, and our national institutions, than Joe Blogger making a random claim without backing it up at all.
With regards to how large the consensus about global warming is... well, all science will have disputed points, always, even gravity ( yes , we are not completely certain how gravity works ) but this doesn't mean that you can't have an overwhelmingly large consensus that a certain phenomena is real, and while you will likely find that climate scientists may disagree about the effects of global warming, it will be about things along the lines of "will it take 20 years or 100 years to get X degrees of warming?" or "will sea levels rise 1m or 10m within the next 100 years?" what very few scientists question is that human emissions of CO2 have an impact upon the climate, and that these effects are in many cases going to cause quite severe damage. Sea level rise alone is enough to justify a sentence along the lines of "There is an overwhelming consensus among climate scientists that anthropogenic CO2 emissions will cause severe damage to ecosystems and human populations across the globe.".
My main point is that, yes, there are disputed features of global warming, but these are about finer points. That human CO2 emissions will cause widespread damage across the globe is doubted by a VERY tiny minority of climate scientists.
>> So, basically what I'm saying is that I don't worry about nuclear power because there is nothing to worry about.
.
And nuclear only produces 30% of the greenhous gasses for the same amount of energy put into the grid. As the resources deplete rapidly in the next 50 years, the less economic the minerals, the harder it gets to extract the uranium, the more CO2 will be produced.