Unfriendly Climate Greets Gore At Apple Meeting

theodp writes "Apple's shareholder meeting this week took on a Jerry Springer vibe, with harsh comments about Al Gore, former VP and Apple board member, setting the tone. Several stockholders took turns either bashing or praising Gore's high-profile views on climate change. Apple shareholder Shelton Ehrlich urged against Gore's re-election to the board, claiming that Gore 'has become a laughingstock. The glaciers have not melted. If [the] advice he gives to Apple is as faulty as his views on the environment then he doesn't need to be re-elected.' Hey, at least he moved a few copies of Keynote, Shelton. Shareholders introduced proposals regarding Apple's environmental impact — one asking Apple to commit publicly to greenhouse gas reduction goals and to publish a formal sustainability report; another proposing that Apple's board establish a sustainability committee. These proposals were rejected by shareholders. However, preliminary voting results indicated that Gore was re-elected to Apple's Board."

Comments

Fools.

[rmushkatblat]

Well, at least the shareholders aren't buying into "sustainability" scam.

Re:Fools.

[rmushkatblat]

Yeah, pretty much. Whoever modded me troll obviously doesn't understand what I was trying to say, beyond bashing AGW. IMPLEMENTING "GREEN" POLICIES ISN'T A GOOD BUSINESS DECISION.

Re:Fools.

[JackieBrown]

Most Christians I know think that climate change is real and that man will destroy the world. None can give any examples or facts other than to point to "Day After Tommorow."

Most atheists and agnostics I know question (or deny - but that seems to be a dirt word nowadays)the validity of man-cause global warming.

I am Chritian and do not care one way or the other but do try to do my best to mininze how much I polute the world.

Also, God should be capitalized since it is a proper noun. In fact, in your context, you used it as a name/title. If you were speaking of Obama by title, you would write "The American President would..." not "The American president would..."

Re:Fools.

[timmarhy]

question. would you have called einstient a denier when he questioned newtonian mechanics?

Re:Fools.

[AnotherUsername]

Also, God should be capitalized since it is a proper noun.

How can it be a proper noun when it's nothing more than a label for a mythical creation? god. god god. god god god god. god.

Looks like somebody didn't do so well in elementary school English.

Re:Fools.

[johncadengo]

Oh, and to address your specific point:

there's nothing setting god apart from a fairy tale in the eyes of someone demanding proof of his existence, the both lack any physical evidence.

Your criteria is far too broad.

Following your example, I could say: there is nothing setting math apart from a fairy tale in the eyes of someone demanding proof of its existence, they both lack any physical evidence.

Re:Fools.

[Cally]

I am reminded again of why I stopped reading Slashdot. Goodbye again, morons.

Re:Fools.

[boristhespider]

"there is nothing setting math apart from a fairy tale in the eyes of someone demanding proof of its existence, they both lack any physical evidence."

LOL. Except perhaps the computer in front of you, the internet you're typing on and the very modern world you're living in? Without physics, which is ultimately nothing more than applied maths, you'd never have any of these. Without engineering, which being basically applied physics is also just applied maths, you'd never have any of these. No modern world and *nothing* that is in it. Comparing that to "God", who is attested to by a bunch of books derived from a bunch of books compiled by a bunch of captive goatherders in skirts in Babylon -- a credibility that is actually well surpassed by the Grimm Brothers, which was compiled by a couple of linguists who revolutionised the study of language and myth and folklore, is too breathtaking to be laughable.

Re:Fools.

[mwvdlee]

Do you think he might be able to get the girls, if he turns down the stereo?

He should get an old Mercedes diesel, fix it up, and make his own biodiesel. That would save serious CO2 production and be affordable (some people are homebrewing for 0.5 dollars/gallon).

Yes, because girls just love the smell of deep fried cow pie.

Re:Fools.

[dudeman2]

The problem is that those BS detectors are tuned to be so sensitive that they tend to register false positives. I.e., 9/11 "truthers", the people who believe Obama's birth certificate is a fraud, etc. The question I ask these people is "what amount of evidence would cause you to change your views?" They'll toss off a few impossible to satisfy conditions or just crank up the crazy. Bottom line is, you're never going to convince these folks that their view is wrong, evidence be damned. Same for the global warming "skeptics". Exactly what amount of evidence will be required to convince the board of Exxon that global warming is a fact?

Re:Fools.

[D66]

Wow, I haven't seen a argument in favor of an Authoritarian Communist regime like this one in a long time. Class warfare, vilifying of those who succeed, reasoning to justify Oligarchical control, its all in that post!
  The "drones" are the enemy - translates to "the common people are too stupid to run their own affairs and must be controlled by an authoritarian benevolent leadership
The "Super Rich Enemies of Humanity" - Classic Communist propaganda line used to justify the assault on successful capitalists and then the redistribution of their wealth by force

Humanity tried that approach coastwalker, it failed. The result was millions dead and liberty denied for Half a Century.

This is a scientific argument, lets leave the class warfare debates of the early 20th century out of this.

Re:Fools.

[khallow]

So, if a parent told their children, 'We're going to be out for an hour. We're leaving you in charge of the house while we're goine,' and they came home and the house was burned down... how happy do you think they'd be with their children?"

The better analogy would be that the parent comes back and finds that the kids have turned up the heat from 68 to 72.

Re:Fools.

[Hardtrance]

Hows about a car analogy. You give your kid a car for his sixteenth birthday. He takes it it and drives it into a tree, toataling it. You: "How the hell could you do such an irresponsible thing?" Kid: "You said it was mine. I figured I could do whatever I wanted with it".

I always read 'dominion over the Earth' as God charging man with stewardship of the Earth, not a blank check to destroy it.

Of course, the Fundies will tell me that it's not for me to interpret the Bible, but as Steven Colbert said: "God wrote the Bible in English for a reason."

Re:Fools.

[bartwol]

So, if a parent told their children, 'We're going to be out for an hour. We're leaving you in charge of the house while we're goine,' and they came home and the house was burned down... how happy do you think they'd be with their children?"

The better analogy would be that the parent comes back and finds that the kids have turned up the heat from 68 to 72.

But now you've moved from a weak, over-dramatized metaphor to a realistic perspective.

Analogies like yours can turn a sensational story in a bunch of not-particularly-exciting facts.

Re:Fools.

[khallow]

Let me put this bluntly, the biggest enemy of humanity is not global warming or terrorists, its you.

And of course, you have thousands of scientific papers and the consensus of the climatology community agreeing that "rmushkatblat" is worst than global warming or terrorists. Guess we'll have to take him out back and shoot him then.

This AGW debate is not about the science

Your post definitely is proof by example. Let me give an example. Take the claim "We must reduce man-caused carbon dioxide emissions because the benefits of doing (with respect to global warming and ocean acidification mitigation) are bigger than the costs". The problem with this claim is that it hasn't been backed by scientific or economic evidence. My view is that scientists have a relatively convincing argument that there is some degree of AGW going on. But going from that to "We should reduce carbon emissions" requires more than application of the Environmentalist faith.

Re:Fools.

[phantomfive]

Oh go fuck yourself. You've just said that everyone who thinks global warming might not be a crisis is either mind-jacked or 'a small core of wealthy individuals.' That's the dumbest thing I've heard all day. Your post is so out of touch with reality it's almost not worth responding to.

Anthropogenic Global Warming is real according to the science.....millions who will die as a result of global warming through wars over mass migration etc

Millions will not die, there is no scientific link between these two things. Climate models can't accurately predict changes in rainfall, they can't predict anything on smaller than a continental level (and even that they do poorly). Do some research, see what you come up with. The idea that Anthropogenic Global Climate Change will be a crisis is in no way 'real according to the science'. There is no consensus on this (there is consensus that CO2 affects the atmosphere, but not that global warming will cause a crisis). Aids is a crisis. Deforestation due to poverty is a crisis, that is something we should focus our efforts on. The earth warming 1 to 2 degrees due to a doubling of CO2 is not a crisis.

Its about the subjugation of the American people by an ideology that despises the common man.

The common man in America is doing pretty well. Even the homeless guy who sleeps outside my house sometimes is doing better than the average person in some other places, and he really deserves nothing. Marxism is dead, let it go. Focus on problems that are real: it isn't about the rich vs the poor.

Re:Who are the denailists?

[timmarhy]

you sir have hit the nail on the head. there is often very little science on both sides this debate. a lot of the ranting reminds me of an emotional 13yo girl screaming about how we have to save the world.

Re:Flamewar imminent

[Anonymous Coward]

Have you read the interview Phil Jones did with the BBC. He came clean and admitted that there is no evidence of man made global warming. This is the TOP GUY, who still believes its true, and given millions upon millions to prove it over a 20 year period, he was unable to.

His research is the basis for ALL international AGW research, including current cap and trade in UK, and all of the UN's IPCC reports. Everything based off of what Mr. Jones did, which is pretty much everything, is a lie admitted to by the lead researcher. For those living in the USA, this has not been reported in the news that you are likely to see.

There is no such thing as an AGW denier, there are only AGW proponents which are fact deniers.

Re:Don't understand the hostility...

[techno-vampire]

(regardless of the fact that the global warming models actually predict this kind of thing)

Actually, the models were corrected to "predict" this after the fact.

Re:wind

[pengin9]

anyone who thinks nuclear power is unsafe is uninformed and obviously gets all his information from the same sources that still spout man made global warming in the mist of a cooling period.

Re:Who are the denailists?

[The End Of Days]

People who are seriously interested in financial gain, if they go into the sciences at all, certainly aren't going to pick climatology as their cash cow.

Climate science is a multi-billion dollar industry, and if they said "hey, everything is cool!" there would be no reason to allocate any more money to it.

Be that as it may, what exactly is so sacred about AGW theories that is beyond examination? Nothing deserves that status.

Global climate CHANGE

[SmallFurryCreature]

It is about the change in temperature, and shifting weather pattens. Not about how hot it is.

You can spot a denialist by how they focus on the current outside temp. like a smoker with cancer, one lung, no lyrnax, claiming that smoking hasn't killed him yet.

'Trendy' brand, 'trendy' shareholders.

[unity100]

they just turned 180 degrees, because some conservative media outlets made a big fuss about something they (deliberately) misunderstood and misrepresented, and now, in lieu of scientific data, suddenly, al gore is 'laughing stock' and climate change is no more ...

a normal questioning and criticism of VALID data, which should happen (and actually mandatory) for many science projects, has been enough for those people to ditch the entire thing, because some conservative national tvs made a big fuss about it. trendy as far as trends go. also speaks volumes about the attitudes of apple fans and their responses to criticism. god forbid if you question anything ...

Re:Who are the denailists?

[microbox]

And you, sir, are not helping by demonizing those who think differently than you.

With all due respect, there was consensus on the science in 1979. The talk includes a very good section about how political action groups have muddied the waters and turned the debate "laughable".

I think this short video deftly serves as an example of how the debate is enacted.

Also, David Suzuki has an excellent page on the topic of AGW. You don't think he's one of those ignoring science for financial gain do you?

btw, the merits of the arguments can be assessed independent of the motives of each "side". All you got to do is read the sources yourself. It is not a daunting as it seems, because you will very quickly discover that one side is just completely full of !#%@

Climategate was a paranoid farce in a teacup

[microbox]

cf. 'climategate', overrated as it may be

Climategate was not overrated -- it was a paranoid farce in a teacup, but let me explain further .

These are just two videos among many that demonstrate just how out to lunch climate gate is.

Of course, you could just go and read the sources yourself and decide if the CRU scientists really did anything wrong. Can *you* find a single example?

Plenty of glaciers have been rapidly melting.

[newdsfornerds]

http://www.doublexposure.net/photos.html Yeah, couldn't be due to mankind's actions though because we're all God's children. If carbon emissions could cause such devastation, God wouldn't have invented Hummers. Or something.

Some people shut put down the political blinders

[tmp31416]

When I read about Sheldon Whatsisface's comment:

"...Gore 'has become a laughingstock. The glaciers have not melted. ..."

I am appalled. This individual is clearly a unilingual-never-left-his-neighbourhood-right-winger who 99% probability watches only Fox News and listens only to Limbaugh, Savage and other far-right wing-nuts. Has this individual ever traveled abroad, watched/read foreign media, even just talked to people from outside the USA?

People across the globe are already living the consequences of climate change, the landscape is changing and, yes, glaciers are melting (amongst other things).

It doesn't matter what side of the political spectrum you are on, it doesn't matter how much money you are making, the size of your house or its location, your life will be, sooner or later, impacted by climate change. Mother Nature does not give a flying f**k who you are, and will not leave you unaffected by extreme weather or floods or... because you're a right-wing Jzeebus-lovin', bible-thumping "murkan". She's a bitch. And anyone denying it won't change that fact.

This individual should travel and see the world for himself. Maybe then he'd stop making such stupid statements.

I think this quote I once read on /. should be read and reflected upon by as many people as possible:

"Earth is a production system without backups"

Re:Don't understand the hostility...

[Lehk228]

Even if the theories are wrong, reducing green-house emissions (etc) won't hurt anything but the pocket book.

because the attack on science is well funded by those who stand to lose out if society acts in a timely manner. just like they said tobacco was perfectly safe, leaded gas didn't hurt anyone, and asbestos was something we should build our homes with.

as a group, people are generally ethical in their actions, so when something people like to do is shown to be harmful, it is fairly easy to persuade that it's not really harmful and the people saying it is harmful are filthy liars, because we don't like to give things up, but also do not want to be doing harm, so rejecting the science is emotionally easy.

Re:Don't understand the hostility... (bugfix)

[hkmwbz]

No. The extent of snow certainly does not support global warming.

Typical denialist. Keep insisting that facts are wrong even after having them explained to him.

It merely comes at a politically inconvenient time, when CRU, Penn State University, and the IPCC are being investigated for tampering with the temperature records.

Typical denialist. Misrepresent what's going on and pretend that there's something sinister at work, and that the conclusion has already been reached that they tampered with anything. Pathetic.