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"Dramatic Decline" Warning For Plants and Animals
An anonymous reader writes "Worldwide levels of the chief greenhouse gas that causes global warming have hit a milestone, reaching an amount never before encountered by humans, federal scientists said. Carbon dioxide was measured at 400 parts per million at the oldest monitoring station in Hawaii, which sets the global benchmark. More than half of plants and a third of animal species are likely to see their living space halved by 2080 if current trends continue."
Once again: The sky is falling! : The sky is falling!
Didnt they tell us 350PPM was when doom and gloom would start?and also we are in a cooling period eventhough co2 is rising, plants "breath" co2 so I dont see how more co2 will harm plants.
have you seen my sig? there are many others like it but none that are the same
And NYC was supposed to be 3 feed underwater by 2015. Slashdot, THE EMPEROR HAS NO CLOTHES!!!! Wake up. Climate change is the cry of yesterday's Chicken Little's. Fine some new apocalyptic theory to push onto people to scam them out of their liberties. This hoax has run it's course. You're boring me.
If species are losing their living space it's due to increasing populations of humans burning their habitat, not from a little CO2. Or from humans using the wrong farming practices, but again not due to CO2 levels.
Plants thrive in conditions with elevated CO2, so unless you can justify that some other side effect will hurt the plants, they should be doing better, not worse.
Yeah, again the evil molecule of carbon dioxide the most vicious poison known to man for plants, animals and man alike, endangers our all well being.
It should be banned, right now, before it kills even more plants!
One of the biggest unknowns here is how fast species can adapt. Perhaps some of the "doomed" species have had enough robustness and phenotypic variation built in by long-term evolution to withstand these short-term changes, even if we have no direct evidence that they can survive under the new conditions being created. Or perhaps they really are doomed.
The naysayers won't believe it until we're living in a desert and even then they'll just say it's a bit dry.
ALso - co2 is not a pollutant, it is essential for plants to live which are essential for us to live...
enough already
for your Grandchildren. Those ignoring or making fun of it don't care about their
descendants. I guess Slashdotters may be clever, but not very respectful of science
itself. Very sad indeed !
John Eadie [JE46] http://www.c-art.com `one of these days the dogs aren't going to eat the dog food' - Bill Joy
Maybe the citation is slashdot, since this same story ran less than a week ago. But apparently on slashdot, anything aimed at generating hysteria over global warming merits a two-time appearance.
I'm pretty sure some deniers conclusively proved that this is all bunk in the last article. The problem is that 1) the scientists didn't know that the station is on a volcano, 2) they did know it was on a volcano and they still put the CO2 detector inside the volcano right above the liquid-hot magma, 3) there are no ice cores on Hawaii, 4) ice cores are completely unreliable for anything anyway, 5) the CO2 monitored is only applicable to Hawaii, more specifically a few meters around the detector and does not register global CO2 levels, 6) China still exists thereby making all readings void, 7) these readings don't matter, 8) these readings are all faulty because I don't know how they get them, 9) these readings align well with other CO2 stations across the globe, and we all know that repeatable and reliable numbers are a sign of confirmation bias not accuracy, 10) these numbers are void because of Climategate probably, 11) these numbers are valid but don't matter because I don't know why, 12) plants like CO2 therefore any changes in the environment are offset by wonderful new foliage, and 13) these numbers are void because Al Gore still exists.
Why are we still even discussing this? It has been demonstratively proven false.
the best comments always appear at -1. especially for stupid repetitive discussions like this.
It seems that the 'talking point' of the eco-marxists today "unprecedented" levels of CO2...was actually disproven in 2008:
http://icecap.us/images/uploads/08_Beck-2.pdf (from 2008)
"The record clearly demonstrates that [CO2 levels were] significantly higher than usually reported for the Last [Glacial] Termination, with levels of up to ~425 ppm about 12,750 years ago, which exceeds the present CO2 concentration of 395 ppm."
This explains thoroughly that
a) it's fundamentally a fallacy to compare Vostok data with Mauna Loa CO2 results (from 3000+ m altitude), and
b) that CO2 values frequently exceeded 400 in both this and the last centuries (as high as 480 depending on how you look at it).
-Styopa
By the year 2081, more than half of these types of predictions are likely to be shown to be more than half true.
400 ppm sounds like a lot until it is compared to the count in an exhaled breath, about 45,000 ppm.
Seems we're suffering from a bit of Climate Change Fatigue... which suggests that the less than 1% of credible scientists who doubt AGW have managed to sow enough seeds of dramatic dissent for the rest of us to lose interest.
Or perhaps, it is something a little simpler in the human psyche. Whilst we bemoan politicians who have no more future vision than the end of their current term, it seems that we too are particularly short-sighted about the future of this planet. I suspect that the majority of us look little further than how we're going to satisfy the physical aspects of Maslow's Heirarchy of needs.
When our life expectancies are extended to 1000 years (or more), and we face the very real prospect of living on the planet we are currently terraforming, we may take a slightly different view. Somehow, I doubt it. Most of the people alive today will live to see an increase of 4-6 degrees C... and yet, we're far more interested in gun control and the Kardashians.
I feel sad for our children (and their children) when I think about the world they will inherit from us.
"so I dont see how more co2 will harm plants". Yes you do, you just wanted to do a quick denial thing. From the article:
"An international team of researchers looked at the impacts of rising temperatures on nearly 50,000 common species of plants and animals."
"They looked at both temperature and rainfall records for the habitats that these species now live in and mapped the areas that would remain suitable for them under a number of different climate change scenarios."
"The scientists projected that if no significant efforts were made to limit greenhouse gas emissions, 2100 global temperatures would be 4C above pre-industrial levels."
"In this model, some 34% of animal species and 57% of plants would lose more than half of their current habitat ranges. "
So the models very much in line with the UN one at 4 degrees, it will expand the dessert along the equators and push species north into a smaller area presumably. But hey, if you deny it, it won't happen right?
I'll be dead by then... Good luck suckers!
I just ran across Kevin Anderson's lecture again. Watch it.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RInrvSjW90U
thegodmovie.com - watch it
I don't care. I do things for myself that have environmental benefit but I don't do it because the environment but more because it's the humane thing to do. I can't force others to do anything. I cannot bend the will of the government nor would I even if I could. I'll be dead by the time any of this stuff happens and I simply don't care what people do. So eat, drink and be merry. Human life doesn't need to continue for any real reason and I can't see any reason to think that even if we do continue as a species that it's going to matter in the long run. The more we're given the more of a bunch of assholes we become. Que sera, sera.
Biggest problem is the dessert band along the equator, and the reduction in habitable area further north (earth being a globe and all, as you squeeze the habitable zone towards the poles, the area becomes less).
If you slowed down the change, then we could adapt a lot better.
I don't think the loss in physical land area caused by rising water is the major problem here.
Yet another call to curtail liberty. Prove otherwise.
CO2 levels of more than 4000 parts per million (ppm) occurred during the Ordovician-Silurian (450 million years ago). There is also evidence of a glacial event occurring during this period. from: http://www.climatechange.gov.au/climate-change/understanding-climate-change/understand-cc-long-term.aspx
I tried to think, but nothin' happened!
More Big Scare tactics. These articles belong in the Science Fiction category so far. We don't know what's going to happen, we've never been there before, but we're assured that it's going to be bad and only by taking and transferring hundreds of billions of our tax dollars to someone else who is more Progressive than ourselves can we save us all.
HA! (because Slashdot won't let me type: bullshit)
Back in 1975 we were supposed to be freezing by now. Anyone remember that?
Take this with with an equal grain of properly salted password hashes.
"It's the height of ridiculousness to say for those 9 lines you get hundreds of millions."
who actually represent us. Not their interests. But then again, if you knew the ship was already sinking because of a small hole, and you're in the middle of the ocean, would you tell anyone?
"Stop burning fossil fuel? Sure, if you want to kill millions of humans, because they / we all need the fossil fuels to get along."
Dude, just stop driving your SUV 50 miles to work each day, just so you can live in a nicer neighborhood. It won't kill anyone if you drive less.
Oh and do you really need the aircon running at 20 degrees C? Mine runs at 28 when its turned on, and nobody died yet of it. On the other hand it cuts my energy bill a heck of a lot.
" That results in an average 6.5 years shorter lifespan, and if the poverty is experienced as a child, the life shortening is not reversible."
If you spend less on fossil fuels to do the same things, you're richer and thus live longer. Being rich, is not the same as 'burning a lot of fossil fuels'! You are not putting years onto your life by driving that long daily commute. You are not putting years on your life by buying the mineral water shipped from the other ends of the earth.
"Meanwhile, if we could get _this_ to work:"
Why would you do that? If you can get mirror solar electro power to work like that, you'd use *THAT* energy instead of fossil fuels, rather than use the fossil fuels and use the solar energy to capture the carbon! But at least you're not in denial about either the problem (CO2 increase), or the cause of it (fossil fuels).
So we're at least in agreement on the key points, just not about what to do about it.
"Just get prepared for the sort of winters that George Washington had to deal with at Valley Forge."
Ahh a man with a dream! We can't slow down the acceleration, let alone the velocity, let alone reduce CO2 currently!
CO2 levels of more than 4000 parts per million (ppm) occurred during the Ordovician-Silurian (450 million years ago). There is also evidence of a glacial event occurring during this period.
from: http://www.climatechange.gov.au/climate-change/understanding-climate-change/understand-cc-long-term.aspx
And how were mammals handling those environmental conditions? What's that? They didn't exist yet? I'm sorry, what? Yes, apology accepted. No, no, it's okay, we put up with demonstrations of subpar intelligence around here all the time. All is forgiven. :)
Sorry, that's irrelevant. And you can't even see it. The rate of increase in CO2, and the rate of increase in temperature, is the problem. Because today's organisms (and not those of 450 million years ago), on which depend, have evolved under the stable climate of the recent past, and many will have difficulty adapting to such rapid changes. And other things, like glaciers, don't adapt--they were in equilibrium with the stable climate of the past, which is why they are now undergoing changes. Why are you so eager to accept the science that you *believe* supports your "side", and so eager to dismiss science that doesn't? That is fundamentally dishonest.
Allan Savory gave a really good Ted Talk a few months ago backing up that claim with a substantial amount of science and experience. I hope you're not too lazy to watch all twenty-two minutes of it, but if you are, let me give you a quick synopsis. Dr. Savory states that the majority of our global warming issues are due to desertification (the destruction of grasslands and their transformation into desert areas), and he claims that 50% of the CO2 in the atmosphere can be removed simply by ceasing unsustainable agriculture practices and converting these lands into grasslands for grazing.
Yeah, life on earth was different then. Mamals didn't even exist, much less humans.
At the time, all known life was confined to the seas and oceans.
Reading the comments on this post today so reminds me of the movie and ideas behind Idiocracy. The future, today!
wow, 3 dupes. Is that a record? Oh, I guess this one isn't a dupe because some idiot failed 5th grade science and doesn't understand that plants like carbon dioxide.
Do you even lift?
These aren't the 'roids you're looking for.
lea5t I won't
Well, lets face it, the most important thing is the economy grows, and if indefinite human population growth is required to achieve this, then so be it.. who cares about anything else?!
Not FUD. Read the summary. It says it's the highest level ever encountered by humans, not the highest level of all time.
You climate change deniers are---without exception---fundamentally dishonest, completely misinformed or both.
How many plants and animals are going to see their living spaces increase?
An international team of researchers looked at the impacts of rising temperatures on nearly 50,000 common species of plants and animals.
They looked at both temperature and rainfall records for the habitats that these species now live in and mapped the areas that would remain suitable for them under a number of different climate change scenarios.
The scientists projected that if no significant efforts were made to limit greenhouse gas emissions, 2100 global temperatures would be 4C above pre-industrial levels.
In this model, some 34% of animal species and 57% of plants would lose more than half of their current habitat ranges.
The interesting part is that they looked at the "habitats that these species now live in". They did not look at habitats that are not currently suitable for the species to live in. For all we know there could be more area that species could live in when the climate changed. By concentrating on current species ranges the scientists are skewing the results. One should look at the whole system before coming to a conclusion.
It doesn't matter what the level was. It only matters what the CHANGE SPEED is.
If you need a car analogy, try stopping from 200mph over a period of 60s versus stopping from 200mph in a period of 0.1s by slamming into a wall, straight on.
Plants and ecosystems can adapt to change. But it takes TIME. And 100 years is as much time as that car stopping in 0.1s. Climate change occurs at frequency of 10,000s of years, not 10s of years. Forests can "walk" a few kilometers per century, but as hell, they can't sprint any faster no matter what.
The article is not FUD. The only FUD I see here is poasts like yours.
Ever breathe out on one of those conference room CO2 detectors?
Plants and animals? That's me!
You see that big band of grey and red, grey where desert is, and red where desert is soon to be
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Desertification_map.png
You can see it extends right across the USA? Not good.
It's pretty telling that the biggest proponents of Warming Alarmists are now posting AC. A bit too afraid to speak out in support of something that is so obviously blatantly false scare-mongering it would seem...
At the core the argument would seem to be half of animals current environment will be lost to climate change (of course, they don't say how in the article because that would give the whole thing away right off the bat). We already know that dramatic sea rise predictions were way off, so just how is that supposed to happen? A somewhat warmer climate (even 4c warmer) would mean more ariable land, not less, which means more habitat for animals all over...
The only way we see that kind of habitat loss is if we enter a new ice age.
Why are you warming alarmists cycling up ever more ridiculous claims to scare people with? Did you really think that by making more absurd claims once people started realizing you were wrong, that they would start to believe you because FEAR?
So laugh all you want, just be aware we are not laughing WITH you...
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
If you burn all the methane in the atmosphere you'd lower the greenhouse effect.
Methane is 72x better at trapping heat.
CH4 + 2(O2) = CO2 + 2(H2O)
There are other compounds worse than CO2 too. Like nitrous oxides produced by plants fed with high nitrogen fertiliser.
Climate change will cause one half of species to decline, but the other half will take their place, that's how nature works. Question is, which half will we belong to?
What species of plant will evolve to replace Maize within 50 years, and if it could evolve, why isn't it growing in the deserts now?
It's interesting seeing this video where a scientist dissects the predictions:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RInrvSjW90U
The whole thing is worth seeing, but at 45:26 he points out that a global average of 4 degrees, the number the models predict if everything goes right (which includes carbon capture etc.) would mean land temperatures much higher (the sea is more difficult to warm up), 8-10 degrees in central europe, :
40% reduction in maize and rice production near the equator. Wow.
So given the short timescales and such a huge rapid change, I don't think evolution will be the magic cure for this.
" By concentrating on current species ranges the scientists are skewing the results."
But I am glad you're not one of those who denies evolution too!
TFS:
[...]reaching an amount never before encountered by humans, federal scientists said.
There weren't any humans around 450 million years ago.
Furthermore, you copy-and-pasted directly but left out the rest of the paragraph
CO2 levels of more than 4000 parts per million (ppm) occurred during the Ordovician-Silurian (450 million years ago). There is also evidence of a glacial event occurring during this period. This has been used by some to attempt to disprove the link between temperature and CO2. Royer et al. (2006) considered the CO2 forced climate thresholds over the Phanerozoic eon (the last 545 million years). It was found that there is insufficient proxy data to determine that a high CO2 event coincided with the Ordovician-Silurian glacial event. The only proxy CO2 data near this glacial event could be up to five million years younger than the event. Further, the Earth was a very different place during this period including differences in solar luminosity, albedo, distribution of continents and vegetation, orbital parameters and other greenhouse gases.
You should try to think more, brah. It can actually save you from embarrasment.
your insurance company IS taking this seriously. THEY have access to a whole pile a data too showing how often floods, tornados, storm surges etc etc occur and they see a trend of them happening more often which is why insurance premiums are increasing.
Wow, that sounds really scary!!!
Except my house insurance premiums have not gone up. In fact, I don't remember any news stories whatsoever about premiums overall being on the rise across the globe.
But really any issue with premiums going up in one area is no mystery - climate changes and will continue to change, altering conditions over time at various locations. If insurance rises somewhere because there is more risk but fails to fall somewhere else risk is now reduced, you would attribute that to climate change - but why is it not simply greed? Why would an insurance company after all reduce rates for people who are happily paying already... so any altering anywhere would tend to ratchet up rates, making any argument even based on insurance rates invalid.
But again, that's even IF insurance rates were going up all over because of climate change and not simply greater regulation...
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
pesky plants and animals be gone.
-Lod
If you go a bit further back than that, the Earth was a smoldering ball of lava. So if it's up to you I guess it's fine if it becomes that again?
It doesn't matter what the level was. It only matters what the CHANGE SPEED is.
Currently temperature changes are slightly down over ten years.
To put this in the terms you can understand, it's like your car was about ro run into a wall, only accidentally you left it in neutral and it rolled backwards into a curb.
That slight bump you feel is your argument grinding to a frustrating halt, with everyone outside the car wondering just why they wanted to get on your bandwagon to begin with when you apparently can't even tell which way you are driving.
The argument against taking this ten year flat/decline into account by your fellow cultists appears to be that you are measuring over too short a period of time. Yet if we are to believe in a 4C rise by 2080, that leaves less than 65 years to proceed to 4C. Since the average rise before the start of the flat period was about0.16C per decade. Do the math; that's 1.04C in 65 years going by the only evidence of any sustained warming we actually have to go by...
What's also funny about that "your timeframe is too short to really judge" argument is all the scary looking graphs like to show temperature increases from just 1965 or so... so 10 years is WAY to short to judge, but 40 or so years is apparently OK to derive the next thousand years of climate change from. Huh.
Sorry buddy, but we aren't drinking the kool-aid from a bunch of guys who can't even pour into the cups accurately.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
If life hasn't adapted to live in the desert in millions of years, how will it adapt now, in just 50-100 years? I don't believe evolution can save us.
Human Ingenuity? You realize that the climate models, *presume* we will get carbon capture working and CO2 to peak by 2016 (!), to keep the global difference at 4 degrees. So we don't just need that human ingenuity, we need it two decades ago!
" If the Arctic Circle rises in temperatures by 8C again - or even 16C - then Mankind gets more arable land and living space, not less, because polar temps increase disproportionately to equatorial temps. "
Earth is a sphere. Wide in the middle tapering to a point at the poles. We can't live at the poles, they're ice, they'll melt, and underneath rock not soil (no centuries of vegetation to make soil). There's some land under the Antarctic, but it a sphere, 6 month days 6 month nights. We'll need evolution for plants to evolve for that, and still the lack of soil problem.
And you'll be losing the big food producing areas including across the USA:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Desertification
So it might be true, that polar temperatures will go from zero to 8 degrees (x8), while the equator goes up 1 fraction of that, but it doesn't mean the poles can save us.
I think for that human ingenuity to kick in, we need to stop lying to ourselves about the reality here.
Your post shows a general misunderstanding of modern science; the primary goal is to generate headlines via which government funding is obtained. The groups that get the most funding get the hottest lab assistants (and note here we are not specifying which gender, as the modern reader should not judge the sexual appetites of graft-seekers as any path is acceptable these days).
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
where should i send the money?
Any guest worker system is indistinguishable from indentured servitude.
It has also surprised by how many Slashdot posters are willing to utterly forgo the most basic tenets of science for religion.
Take your post for example.
The side that is FOR science is obviously the the one that demands claims followed by proof, demands scientists share data and methods. You know, the one that would demand scientists making claim at least somewhat track with the scientific method.
Until very recently none of that was true of the Warming Cultists. You make claims, that are falsified within five or so years. You can't make a single accurate prediction of how climate will behave in response to changing variables; yet rather than decide perhaps your theory need revision,you decide that the theory just needs another layer of bullshit on top in order for it to grow into big and strong PROOF that you just know is there, because you have FAITH!
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
Matching the right's hyperbole with bigger hyperbole makes the right look more sane as a result.
And what hyperbole on the "right" is that exactly?
It's easy enough to find older papers saying that the tip off point was a time that was in the future then but is now in the past.
Proclaiming the tip-off points were no-where near those points before the time had past, WAS considered hyperbole - before it was shown to be wrong.
Was is so wrong about wanting careful scientific study or merely wanting to open data-sets to confirm theories based on them? There is no hyperbole in that, or at any rate NOTHING approaching the level of hyperbole in a statement like "we are all going to die when Co2 crosses point X". All anyone on the other side has ever said is along the lines of "are you sure it's actually warming even though CO2 levels are increasing" and "how exactly will we all die again"? and "why should we spend billions that could otherwise go to advance medicine or poor people when we can't accurately predict how climate change will affect us"?
And going back to your fist point, this is not "right" vs. "left". This is about conformists vs. individual thinkers. It's about people who simply believe whatever "science" tells them to say, filtered through politicians and the media - with no question. It's about that kind of person vs. the kind of person who gets told at some point food X is bad for them and says "why" and "are you sure", then eventually comes up with new scientific research showing the old models of thought were totally backwards.
Always be suspicious of anyone who claims you are stupid for asking questions and not believing outright what they say.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
This is what counts as evidence for you. Did you ever find some counter evidence? Almost certainly not, right?
For those who are interested, you can read about Beck 2008 here, here, and here.
For the full effect, make sure you actually read through Beck 2008.
Proof that you only need a few bits of junk our there, and that's enough for politics.
Like all pain, suffering is a signal that something isn't right
So what happens when you take this variability and subject it to climate change?
Yeah! Let's go back to 4000ppm! After-all, that's what it was 450 million years ago, so it must be good!!!!
Like all pain, suffering is a signal that something isn't right
Back in 1975 we were supposed to be freezing by now. Anyone remember that?
As in some scientists asked the question, studied it, and rejected the theory after 5 or so years. There was never consensus, but the story was too good not to run in major newspapers.
Do YOU remember it?
More Big Scare tactics. These articles belong in the Science Fiction category so far. We don't know what's going to happen, we've never been there before, but we're assured that it's going to be bad and only by taking and transferring hundreds of billions of our tax dollars to someone else who is more Progressive than ourselves can we save us all.
The only big scare tactics I see are those who preach that the economy was crash if we tax pollution. It is baloney of course. There is empirical data that shows that the effect on the economy is * negligible*. The effect on the Koch brother's political influence will be non-negligible, but that's crony capitalism for you.
Like all pain, suffering is a signal that something isn't right
As an engineer, this is precisely why I have always questioned the global warming hysteria. Nature *abhors* positive feedback cycles. In any system that has been stable over long periods of time, negative feedback dominates.
Positive feedback is critical to the disastrous global warming projections. Specifically, higher CO2 leads to slightly higher temperatures, leads to more water evaporation - and OMG water vapor is a greenhouse gas. If this positive feedback cycle actually worked, it would have been triggered by the massively higher CO2 levels of the distant past.
No one doubts that the earth is warmer now than it was in the 18th century. What warmists avoid is the long-term historical evidence, by which standard today's CO2 and temperature changes are totally irrelevant blips.
Those ignoring or making fun of it don't care about their descendants
Is it any wonder we look down upon you who seek to protect future generations from an unlikely possibility when you are today killing the species you claim to be interested in protecting?
Those who take action today out of irrational fear without knowing for sure real harm will come to the future generations, are literally killing people today.
By pushing for less efficient forms of energy generation you are either taking money away from things like medical research or humanitarian aid. By moving to limit how poorer regions on earth can generate energy you doom millions to starvation and disease.
So WHEN we find out just how much of a hoax the idea that climactic temperature rise can kill off our grandchildren really was, the only true criminals we will come up with are you and the cultists like you, that for a brief window of time had enough data and power to convince whole governments to act against the best interests of the people they were supposed to serve.
Really your Global Cooling Alarmist forebears had a better case for panic, at least if there was truly global cooling on a large scale we'd have something to fear as a species. This new brand of fear is weak sauce and yet you've blown it into even more of a panic, it will take decades to undo the damage you have done to our Earth and the people upon it. Let the millions unnecessarily dead weigh upon you in later years as they should.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
So you have nothing then?
I am waiting for refutation of my original points. It is you who have nothing yet, because obviously posting any information from the actual paper would reveal the farce it truly is (or you would have cited it earlier). I laid out a very reasonable case for why there is no claimed dissolution of habitat in a rise of 4C; it is up to you to provide one single idea that would show otherwise.
I will let you have the last response, because it will simply be another factless ad-hominem attack that is as pointless to read as it is to respond to.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
I give the Slashdot posters a collective D- failing grade.
The early posters get a D- for their really weird inability to say three fresh and funny things about the OP.
The middle posters, get a D- because 90% of the posts are tired sighs.
The tired sighs of many previous posts are an important sign that the global warming problem is a slow moving massive event where the principal indicator of it's progress ( CO2 levels) has not gone down even though we have been through a 5 year economic depression. The abating economic depression did not slow down society enough to affect CO2 levels. (There was a little decrease in the rate of increase, but not in the fact of increase.) The sighs reflect the disappointment and fatigue of many people on this list who have tried to reduce their CO2 footprint and see that all the effort produced no result. CO2 increase is an intractable, slow moving, massive problem.
And lets issue another D- to everybody that cites an expert and therefore excuses themselves from engaging with the global warming problem. If you live a typical drive to work life you are contributing 3,000 to 10,000 pounds of CO2 to the atmosphere every year. Could you possibly reduce your CO2 emission to the level of a 1776 pre steam engine individual? In this case, the phrase "massive problem" means exactly that: a large amount of human generated mass. No matter how subtle the argument, 3000 pounds turned into infra-red absorbing Carbon oxygen bonds is about the mass of your car. Rhetoric is not enough.
Welcome to the lonely world of social change. The problem in front of us is still how to emit 1/2 as much CO2 every day for you, your wife and your kids without losing the happy and fun mechanical conveniences we enjoy and maintaining economic and social stability.
(I am not a chemist, but 2 gallons of gasoline x 7 lb per gallon x 365 days => about 5000 lbs, not counting the weight of Oxygen from air making CO2.)
I think the point was that 4000ppm doesn't doesn't cause global warming to an extent that prevents ice ages.
"We know that carbon dioxide has been a much larger fraction of the earth's atmosphere than it is today, and the geological record shows that life flourished on land and in the oceans during those times. The incredible list of supposed horrors that increasing carbon dioxide will bring the world is pure belief disguised as science."
Wall Street Journal
Assuming you didn't forget the /s:
Are you aware of the state of the biosphere back then? You may want to look up what kinds of plants and animals lived back then.
thegodmovie.com - watch it
Reading through all these comments, I am amazed at the number of posters who simply deny that human activity has caused a sharp increase in the amount of atmospheric carbon dioxide and that that in turn has caused a sharp increase in average global temperature. From a purely scientific standpoint, both of those things have been clearly established as factual and can be measured and verified by anyone, and yet there is such a large number of otherwise highly intelligent people who are adamant that it is not the case.
What is the reason for this?
Yeah but the boomers won't be alive then. Hell, the Koch brothers won't be alive in 10 years. What do they care? I got mine while I was alive, fuck you all, suckers.
I have a dream.
I have a dream where one day the people who today, in editorials and online, deny science, deny global warming will be forced to personally, individually, away from and distinct from the rest of the population be forced to directly bear the consequences of their beliefs. I have a dream .
I have a dream that one day the people who deny evolution will also be systematically and permanently denied the medicine and treatments which exists only because doctors and researchers applied evolutionary theory to the problems of diseases . I have a dream.
I have a dream that each individual, no matter who or how small, will be given the opportunity to live out in full the consequences of what they today advocate for the rest of us and the rest of us will live out the consequences of our own decisions, unencumbered by the science deniers who used to live freely amongst us.
I have a dream.
Yeah, it does. Life will survive this as it survived worse things than that.
But our societies and economies as they are will not. That's the point. You can have "life" adapt perfectly well in the long run and still have global mayhem happening while it is adapting.
Also, "life will adapt" just ignores the fact that changes that happen over thousands of years are easier to adapt to than changes that happen within decades. There's no time for slow migration, ecosystems and economies gradually changing and adapting. Fast changes are incredibly hard to adapt to and the changes we're looking at are happening really quick.
It's the typical jump from "nothing is happening" to "life will adapt" while totally ignoring all the major shit happening to real people and real economies that makes me wonder about the will to face reality in many people. First they close their eyes while pretending "it's a lie, nothing is really happening", then they jump to "life will adapt". Yeah, but life may adapt by you and your children starving.
...the oxygen was so rich that relatively inefficient mechanisms for processing oxygen like breathing through a thorax permitted dragonflies to grow 4 ft long.
http://www.forbes.com/sites/jamestaylor/2012/09/05/dont-believe-the-global-warmists-major-hurricanes-are-less-frequent/
http://earthobservatory.nasa.gov/Features/ClimateStorms/
And that's the great thing about politicized science: The claim two incompatible things will happen simultaneously, then celebrate when one of the two actually comes true.
"Science doesn't want respect, it wants you to ask, "How do we know?" "
It wants you to listen to the answer too. Otherwise all you're doing is going "Lalalalala! Can't hear you!" Which is the antithesis of science.
"As soon as you start believing things because it was said by "the institution of science," that's when it's no longer science anymore."
Oh dear, another "Science isn't consensus". Tell you what, since nearly 100% of science says that gravity exists, jump off a tall building: if you're just believing things because it was said by the institution of science, then you need to get out there and test it, yes?
But lets say you do a less stressful test and confirm gravity.
But then YOU become one of "the institution of science" telling me that gravity exists.
So under your insane rant here, NOBODY should be doing anything other than confirming FOR THEMSELVES that EVERY SINGLE FACT of science is correct.
So when do we get to advance science?
The carbon wasn't "in the atmosphere for living things to use" it WAS the living things, you idiot.
How the hell do you fools moderate this crap up to +5 freaking insightful? Read a god damned book.
The paper uses a global climate model, combines it with assumptions about how that global climate translates into local climates, and then combines that with assumptions and models of how species adapt, but using models that have never been tested under the conditions that they are being used to. Along the way, the authors made dozens of assumptions and arbitrary choices, many of which aren't documented in the paper. The paper presents interesting scientific speculation, not scientific fact or results. For something to be a scientific result, we need replication using new data and independent methods.
Furthermore, the headlines and discussion mixes up "decline in habitat range" with "decline in species". Species have already experienced a more dramatic "decline in habitat range" than predicted in that paper due to human settlements and agriculture. And I would expect that even if this paper were spot-on, habitat loss due to other human activity would still dominate, climate change or not.
Finally, the paper ignores the ability of humans to shape the environment and habitats. Animals and plants don't just randomly drift across the landscape, they are already managed by humans almost everywhere. Therefore, models that ask whether animals can adapt on their own really don't mean much in the real world.
So kill yourself.
Will life on earth end? No.
You also missed two important points that a few global warming scientists have been making:
* All accumulated factual data is good, but science is not a court of law and doesn't work simply by presenting evidence. It works by making mathematical models of the physical world (called theories once they've stood the test of time), deriving testable hypotheses from them, and testing those hypotheses in the real world. Most of this scientific method is absent in the AGW debate, so saying that AGW has the backing of Science is a misrepresentation. It's very early days still in this young science, and the closest we get to the scientific method is our many GCMs used as simulators. Unfortunately they're still very poor at what they do and can't replicate the paleohistory of climate without the help of all manner of prewired kludges, so we're still a long way from a trusted Theory of Climate Science. Very far. AGW is formally still just a belief.
* "We're honest scientists and so we refuse to say that science supports something which it does not, but we're also concerned humans, so STOP POLLUTING THIS FUCKING PLANET, NOW!". This holds despite our current inability to justify this action through the scientific method. You just know it's right.
The article talks about a "dramatic decline of habitat range" for "half of plant species" and a "third of animal species". This does not mean a dramatic decline of species or anything like that.
You could describe the same result as "The study shows that almost all species will have more than enough habitat to survive even under the worst case scenarios of global warming and pessimistic assumptions on their ability to adapt".
That's not what the article says. The article says that a third of the animal species will see a substantial decline in their range. It says nothing about a decline of species or even their populations.
I dug up the National Geographic magazine that so many have quoted as de-facto evidence of the Global Cooling paranoia ... you know what.. the f'k'n graph has a big question mark with one line going down and the other one going up ( like um, warming.. doh ) and calling for real research. Go dig up the issue yourself.. you must know some educated person who had a subscription back then?
At the time there were also hardly any land plants and the Sun was dimmer. While factually correct it's hardly relevant. Likewise, CO2 concentrations are estimated to have been even higher than that in the Archean, more than 2500 million years ago. On the other hand, there also wasn't any significant oxygen in the atmosphere and the Sun was dimmer still.
While Earth history is relevant, if you are looking for analogues, it is to better to focus on the more (geologically) recent Mesozoic and Cenozoic times when CO2 was as high or higher than it is now (e.g., the Paleocence-Eocene thermal maximum ~55 million years ago). Merely picking some random time in Earth history when CO2 was *much* higher isn't particularly instructive because of the many other changes that have occurred.
Oh, for christ's sake. How do you think carbon gets into the bodies of living things? Does the word "photosynthesis" ring any bells? Plants absorb it from the air (or water) around them, form it into sugars, proteins, lipids, etc, and animals eat the plants, digest them, and form it into other compounds. All of the carbon in a coal seam was once CO2 in the atmosphere or dissolved into water.
You have no grounds to call anyone else an idiot, you pedantic twat.
anyone want some? The show is entertaining as always.
Seems to me when there are major opinions (and egos) on both sides the answer is probably somewhere in between. Though not necessarily in the middle.
I'd ask for tickets to Mars but I suspect much like jobs, people will be much the same no matter what planet they are on.
http://www.businessweek.com/news/2013-05-13/u-dot-s-dot-revises-down-co2-reading-that-showed-key-threshold-passed The figure for May 9 has now been revised down to 399.89 ppm....
No good deed goes unpunished.
Earth will survive just fine. Stop this sky is falling BS. The green religion is becoming fundamental.
The figure for May 9 has now been revised down to 399.89 ppm.... http://www.businessweek.com/news/2013-05-13/u-dot-s-dot-revises-down-co2-reading-that-showed-key-threshold-passed
Predictions from the 1970's...
Behold the coming apocalypse as predicted on and around Earth Day, 1970:
1) "Civilization will end within 15 or 30 years unless immediate action is taken against problems facing mankind." — Harvard biologist George Wald
2) "We are in an environmental crisis which threatens the survival of this nation, and of the world as a suitable place of human habitation." — Washington University biologist Barry Commoner
3) "Man must stop pollution and conserve his resources, not merely to enhance existence but to save the race from intolerable deterioration and possible extinction." — New York Times editorial
4) "Population will inevitably and completely outstrip whatever small increases in food supplies we make. The death rate will increase until at least 100-200 million people per year will be starving to death during the next ten years." — Stanford University biologist Paul Ehrlich
5) "Most of the people who are going to die in the greatest cataclysm in the history of man have already been born [By 1975] some experts feel that food shortages will have escalated the present level of world hunger and starvation into famines of unbelievable proportions. Other experts, more optimistic, think the ultimate food-population collision will not occur until the decade of the 1980s." — Paul Ehrlich
6) "It is already too late to avoid mass starvation," — Denis Hayes, Chief organizer for Earth Day
7) "Demographers agree almost unanimously on the following grim timetable: by 1975 widespread famines will begin in India; these will spread by 1990 to include all of India, Pakistan, China and the Near East, Africa. By the year 2000, or conceivably sooner, South and Central America will exist under famine conditions. By the year 2000, thirty years from now, the entire world, with the exception of Western Europe, North America, and Australia, will be in famine." — North Texas State University professor Peter Gunter
8) "In a decade, urban dwellers will have to wear gas masks to survive air pollution by 1985 air pollution will have reduced the amount of sunlight reaching earth by one half." — Life magazine
9) "At the present rate of nitrogen buildup, it's only a matter of time before light will be filtered out of the atmosphere and none of our land will be usable." — Ecologist Kenneth Watt
10) "Air pollution...is certainly going to take hundreds of thousands of lives in the next few years alone." — Paul Ehrlich
11) "By the year 2000, if present trends continue, we will be using up crude oil at such a rate that there won't be any more crude oil. You'll drive up to the pump and say, ‘Fill 'er up, buddy,' and he'll say, ‘I am very sorry, there isn't any.'" — Ecologist Kenneth Watt
12) "[One] theory assumes that the earth's cloud cover will continue to thicken as more dust, fumes, and water vapor are belched into the atmosphere by industrial smokestacks and jet planes. Screened from the sun's heat, the planet will cool, the water vapor will fall and freeze, and a new Ice Age will be born." — Newsweek magazine
13) "The world has been chilling sharply for about twenty years. If present trends continue, the world will be about four degrees colder for the global mean temperature in 1990, but eleven degrees colder in the year 2000. This is about twice what it would take to put us into an ice age." — Kenneth Watt
The most important thing to do is actually spot-check references. This is so poorly and rarely done that you will very quickly sort the wheat from the chaff when it comes to arguments about climate change. (And pretty much anything else.) Sure it takes time, but you learn a *lot* by following how people argue.
It is not too difficult to separate the signal from the noise, but you have to eschew black and white thinking. There are plenty of "earth-is-holy" nutcases out there who desperately believe in AGW, and have no friggin' clue about anything other than their spirit guide. But those people do not work in universities.
If you are interested in seeing some detailed analysis on "skeptic" arguments, then I recommend Peter Hadfield's excellent 5 video series on Monckton: Monckton Bumkin. Sure he makes fun of Monckton, but you'll see why if you actually watch some Monckton videos and then try and trace the arguments. Monckton walked away from a direct conversation with Peter Hadfield on Monckton responds to Potholer54 on the "skeptic" website WUWT.
If you are interested in how information flows through society, then Naomi Oreskes has an excellent book on the disinformation campaign: Merchants of Doubt. It is a little too detailed for a light read, but the details are stomach churning in their audacity.
Getting to the core of the scientific issues is more work. I'm working on a phd, and have a long background in math, modeling, and also some understanding of scientific culture. That type of experience doesn't just fall in your lap. skepticalscience does a good job.
Like all pain, suffering is a signal that something isn't right
All this stuff is a lie. You believe in "global warming" religion, even if you consider youself as an atheist.
Could you explain after so many years what was the reason to give Nobel Prize for Al Gore? BTW Could you also explain what was the reason to give Nobel Prize for Obama?
and
It seems even when Co2 has absolutely nothing to do with it, it's the cause. Well, I suppose it prevents you from suggesting that if only Human's weren't so successful and more of them died from malnutrition, the cold or their dentition, we could save so many plants and animals. That's what you want to say, isn't it?
I think the point was that 4000ppm doesn't doesn't cause global warming to an extent that prevents ice ages.
And I think the counter point is that, regardless of ice ages, there's no reason to assume that it'll be a cakewalk for homo sapiens.
That period also ended with the second largest extinction event behind the Permian-Triassic.
People don't want to change so they deny the credibility of the evidence staring them in the face. Are you really that dense that you cannot see the effects of global climate change around you now? Bleaching of Coral reefs[0], Hurricane frequency[1], Shrinking of one of the largest glaciers on earth[2] not to mention the rate of change in global temps[3] for the past century. Yes it's been warm in the past, but the RATE at which warming occurred has never been seen before. These are the facts and they are happening now. I guess for a lot of people it's more comforting to glue their noses to the manufactured reality of Fox News and the like rather than accept what is happening and that change is needed.
[0] - http://oceanservice.noaa.gov/facts/coral_bleach.html
[1] - http://www.ucar.edu/news/releases/2007/hurricanefrequency.shtml
[2] - http://www.dispatch.com/content/stories/science/2013/04/21/tracking-greenlands-fast-melting-ice-sheets.html
[3] - http://www.npr.org/2013/03/08/173739884/since-end-of-last-ice-age-rates-of-global-warming-amazing-and-atypical
[3] -
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The world had much higher levels of carbon dioxide millions of years ago and the effect was that there were more species alive and thriving than at any other time since. The planet was also several degrees warmer but that didn't harm plant and animal life, they exploded in diversity and numbers. When are we going to realize that the planet is still in recovery from the last ice age? The global thermostat changes of it's own accord whether human beings live in caves and hunt in packs, or fly to a space station.
There are bigger problems in the world. Disease, war, hunger, human rights violations, and our ever decreasing personal freedoms. How about we spend our time, effort, and money, on fixing things that will actually benefit society and spend a little less time worrying about carbon dioxide.
If I give enough of my money the Government or the UN, as they ask, they're going to do something about this? They're going to control the weather?
I may not be a climatologist and I can't argue the science either way, but I do know BULLSHIT when I hear it.
Research shows that 67% of those who use the term "research shows", are just making shit up.
I'd rather spend billions learning how to terraform our deserts than have some quacks allow government to make us live in cells in fascist mega-cities.
This really goes to the heart of the "skeptic" argument. And to think "skeptics" call scientists alarmists, when the whole a-science movement is based on fear of some imaginary future.
Say, what's wrong with a carbon tax? To make it revenue neutral, you can reduce income taxes. The market can sort out how to factor in the cost of carbon pollution. Where are the fascists in that? By what right do a few well connected businesses get to use the whole earth as a big exhaust pipe without paying for it? Where is the personal responsibility?
The economic evidence shows that mitigating climate change costs almost nothing. There has been no fascist take-over. In my experience, conservatives doen't even know what fascism is.
It really is a case of science versus fear-based ignorance.
Like all pain, suffering is a signal that something isn't right
What is this evidence they have for humans not being around since these CO2 levels began?
Idiots like Al Gore and his climate carbon tax credit pushing morons, constantly point out man made climate change.
Yet, they are shown to constantly make up and falsify the scientific evidence.
Furthermore intelligent people don't deny climate change, the problem is:
1) Is it man made, and how much?
2) Paying _any_ sort of taxes to the globalists isn't going to stop _any_climate change.
3) The SUN is _the_ primary (99.9%) of climate change.
People who are called climate nay sayers usually answer 1) Yes, but the scientific process is corrupted by 2) Al Gore and his crony globalist friends who put together the carbon credits exchange is a scam, 3) Gigantic, TONS of evidence for the SUN being the primary driving force for all climate and nothing really matters that much besides. And when the sun has minimums, we have ice ages, or the earths orbit is changed.
Contrary to popular belief, the whole climate research field is incredibly corrupt. Globalists are funding any research as long as it concludes the planet is doomed because YOU, mind you....YOU not THEM (i.e. Al Gore, Queeny England....etc.) have to endure enormous sacrifices, as they jet around in their lavish lifestyles.
It is all crap.
-Hack
Got Geometrodynamics? Awe, too hard to figure out? Too bad.
The ozone issue had actually been faced before
Wrong. It was the first time.
. The main industries using CFCs were for propellants and refrigeration. We already had other propellants, and for applications that they weren't suitable pump-bottles were substituted.
Wrong. I used to know someone working for a fridge company trying to figure out new safe coolents. Back then nothing came close to CFCs. They figured it out.
What's happening with global warming is that we're being asked to change our entire lifestyles, and give up our human rights.
Wrong, wrong, wrong, wrong. It will cost almost nothing to do something about climate change. Renewables as of 2013 are about price parity with carbon for electricity generation. The prices are /plummeting/. Google/walmart will be running their data-centres/stores on renewables in less than a decade -- TO SAVE MONEY -- and that is without factoring the real cost of carbon pollution.
The economic scare-mongering on AGW was done by exactly the same people as the econommic scare-mongering on the ozone whole, and acid rain. The same people also fought tooth-and-nail over protecting the tobacco industry. The same people also fought tooth-and-nail to defend the GOP's hair-brained star-wars program.
The term "alarmist" is just good marketing. It is projection. There is nothing to be alarmed about.
Like all pain, suffering is a signal that something isn't right
This was already tried once. As I recall it didn't end well for the US.
In any event, it would never be a military invasion. It would be slow capitulation by politicians (Conservatives) to the US over everything, until for all intents and purposes we might as well have been annexed.
Canadian politicians need to grow some balls to stand up to the economic bully in the south.
The answer is so simple, but at the same time no one wants to acknowledge it. The human population must be reduced by at least 3/4. With the global population at 7.1billion and all the support infrastructure it takes to maintain that population. CO2 will never be reduced. Manufacturing will have to continue to cloth and feed and produce heat, etc. Zero Population Growth. It was a fantastic, but obscure movie from the 1970s, and I think it was quite prophetic. With all animal populations in decline, you would think someone would have started grasp the obvious.
What gets rid of CO2? Plants! At least during the day. Start a global plant a tree frenzy. Or, perhaps the next big hi-rise in a metropolitan skyline should not be over priced town house condos, but a HUGE atmospheric processing plant. Whatever the solution is to this problem, it better happen with a couple decades, or we've fucked this planet up beyond all hope of supporting human life.
Umm,
Plants actually "like" CO2. So more CO2 in the atmosphere is good for plant growth. Why would there be less plants if they have more food? It's like claiming humans will die off if the amount of oxygen in the atmosphere increases a bit.
I don't know anyone who assumes that the government owns us. That's just absurd. Those tax receipts buy civilization. You don't want to pay any taxes? Move to Somalia. Problem solved.
But really, this is about getting civilization and not paying for it. How about paying for the things you use?
The GOP couldn't care less about reducing the deficit, or working out how to responsibly spend money. All the brohaha about cutting government in half is just bullshit. The tea party base do want to reduce the size of government, but not the things that they use, which is almost all of government, so they'll be the first to whine if their social security or medicare is cut. But by their own lights, they never used a dime of government either.
Where is the responsibility?
Like all pain, suffering is a signal that something isn't right
but is it caused by humans?
Nope!
very sad indeed, lets all blame the sun
How this for you? I live in a rural community when I visit friends and family that live in larger cities {like Chicago} the smog gives me a soar throat that lasts a couple days. I don't need a study to tell me we need to clean up our act. We can debate global warming, or just work on finding cleaner, better, more efficient ways of doing things because it will benefit us.
The living space will indeed be halved, but it will have nothing to do with the atmosphere. It will have everything to do with the human population choking the life out of everything else on the earth.
Stop having so many brats.
Oh, not so good.
All that means is you're now the "science consensus".
And I've seen birds. PROOF that gravity is a hoax!!!! Funded by the airline industry.
You see, thing is that if something REALLY exists, then there will be a consensus of people who, having looked, agree it exists.
Science is a consensus. If nobody agrees on some facet of theory, then it is not proven.
#1: you have agreed with.
#2 you completely made up.
#3 you completely made up.
So the only thing you disagree with is what you've made up to scare yourself shitless at the thought of doing anything about AGW.
Because there's plenty who accept uncritically "It will be good for us" or "The economy will collapse" or "China will just take all the oil if we don't first!".
But where are these people who " uncritically accept the hypothesis" of AGW?
I'll throw my two cents out into the "noise". I've noticed a depressing trend in recent years. People tossing trash out of their cars. Invariably it is the leftovers of some fast food meal, choked down in the car, and tossed out the window for someone else to pick up -- or not. The streets in my neighborhood are festooned with such litter. Originally, I blamed the problem on one particular ethnic group below a certain age. But in time I've noticed people of all colors doing the same thing, and of an age when they really should know better.
What does this have to do with CO2 levels? My point is, how can we expect people to care about the larger problems, if they won't even deposit their trash in a proper receptacle? I would like to start improving the planet in ways that pretty much everyone can agree upon. Let us begin taking care of the trash. Then maybe we can start working on the bigger problems.
Proverbs 21:19
So once again, "CO2 at 400 ppm! The End is Near!" prophets have come out with yet another insane prediction. And people on the chat boards believe it, again! In my 45 some years on this planet I have seen no less than 20 doomsday predictions (it's about every 18 months, it's like Moore's Law for crazy people). Some of the best nuclear war, nuclear power, DDT, ozone hole, over population, Y2K, and of course Planetary Alignment, just to name a few. So here is my question for the skeptics out there. Why do people keep believing this BS? Is it new suckers being born every generation who just don't know any better? Or is it the same fools who are just so gullible that they firmly believe the world is going to end every couple years despite the fact it never has? When Professor Paul R. Ehrlich wrote "The battle to feed all of humanity is over. In the 1970s hundreds of millions of people will starve to death in spite of any crash programs embarked upon now. At this late date nothing can prevent a substantial increase in the world death rate...", are these the same guys who believed it then or an entirely new batch of suckers?
Useless drivel from researchers trying to get their belly up to the feeding trough...
I've been reading Slashdot every day for at least 6 years straight. And prior to that at least every week for a number of years. I've never logged on before. But, had to create an account and log on just because of this comment. You sir, or mam (as the case may be), have written (IMHO) the best comment I've ever seen ANYWHERE concerning this issue and definitely the best I've ever seen on Slashdot. And, as you expected, it was not taken kindly. Not a big deal. Don't let it get you down. Also, IMHO, this comment should be placed at the head of any future "climate" related threads. However, I doubt that will be the case. In any event, I will pass this forward to my children and friends. Pretty sure I'm going to print in out and post it on the wall also (let me know if that is NOT okay, I'll put your name at the bottom as the originator). Please feel free to make more comments in the future. I had almost given up hope on human intelligence. My hope has been somewhat renewed : ) Thanks, Torrn
Savory's talk is great. He has a gut belief that this may be a large factor in warming. There is no statistical or scientific analysis that challenges the IPCC findings. The bit about reversing climate change has effectively nothing to do with his speech, but is great advertising to get people like you to spread it around. I hope he succeeds in his goals of fighting desertification. I hope he is right about warming. Both are speculative, the later pie in the sky.
Like all pain, suffering is a signal that something isn't right
I don't know anyone who thinks that the federal government should take care of everyone.
/still/ mainly old people who receive government money for social security and medicare, who want to cut the size of government, without touching their windfalls. And the military. According to some yet-unknown math.
The constitution does agree with federal law, because the actions of the supreme court are part of the constitution. Like all fundies, there is always a danger of mistaking your interpretation of a document as the literal meaning of the document.
And the tea-partiers are
Like all pain, suffering is a signal that something isn't right
The weatherman cannot accurately predict the weather one week from now. An intellectual cannot possibly predict a species seeing their living space halved by 2080.
WTF is an "eco-Marxist" other than someone you don't like? Calling people names isn't really an argument.
the human being itself is "the pest" ?! ;-)
The basic reason it's happening is the radical depletion of the Amazon rain forest, pure and simple. That rain forest was and still is, in whatever measure, the LUNGs of this planet.
The same holds for the media.
Where does it say anywhere that the press owes you an accurate, well-researched story? The media exists not to inform but to sell advertising.
Media and Politics are two sides of the same see-saw. Both sides want our attention and our money, but ultimately benefit us nothing.
If you are passionate about global warming, stop consuming electricity, stop driving your car, stop eating processed foods, stop using air conditioning, stop heating your house with fossil fuels, stop wearing synthetic fibres, stop buying over-packaged products, make individual choices that get the attention of others.
Just don't be a jerk about it. Be a positive role model. Don't be a pious martyr. Don't drive a Prius and think you are changing the world.
The attention that you create causes questions to get asked, and you win hearts and minds one at a time. Nobody wants to do this because it takes work and time. They would rather see who can scream the loudest on the weekend news shows, and settle for a knee-jerk steaming pile of legislation that is a result of mis-informed horse trading.
Totally expecting to lose karma points on this one.
Used to be a time when one didn't have to proclaim or deny "science" or have a degree in a particular scientific field.
It was in this time that there was a common understanding that we are all stewards of the planet and that it always requires our attention and focus. Today, it seems to be considered only upon whether you're speaking as a scientist or not?
Why?
We've lost the general precept that the Earth CANNOT sustain itself or repair all actions made to it.
Today we consider fracking because it only provides a fuel at 1/2 the cost of gasoline, but destroys water tables and potentially threatens geologic formations deep underground.... It seems if you're against fracking, you're anti-American - which is really saying you need to be stupid, turn the other cheek and pretend nothing is really happening?
How long with CO2 rising and temperatures flat or declining will it take before this nonsense about CO2 being the control knob on the climate is thrown out? 20? 30? 50? Never?
We have had CO2 go up 8-10% over the last 15 years but the temperatures have not. At some point you have to get your heads out of the models and back into reality. If your theory and reality differ then your theory is WRONG.
Boy oh boy they must not want to scare anyone.. 2080 sound so.. "safe".. try 2020, if you want a more realistic date....
And, I live on Hawaii. Besides, the article is wrong.
That's right, tree huggers. Look it up. Haven't broken "400" yet.
Damn nerds, where the hell do you get information, anyway?
Hmmm..I think the procreation problem is a personal one. I have kids and grand kids on two continents.
But I have to wonder if climate science is too. I wonder what effect pure heat has on temperature :D. Anthropogenic heat generation has probably increased along similar, or perhaps even greater lines to that of carbon dioxide.
Using figures pulled from wikipedia, average global temperature is 14C, current is 14.4, so from what I've found today, temperature is 5.6% above normal, and has increased 11.2% since 1880. Atmospheric carbon dioxide has gone from 280ppm to 400, so 0.012% increase...
The greenhouse effect of carbon dioxide is far from linear too. The more there is, the less you get.
Please only reply if you can shed some light on my observations. I've already tried to work it out for myself, and no, I don't want to trust the "scientific consensus".
The Milankovitch cycles are well known as the major reason for the climate cycles along with the precession of the equinoxes, The others are all bit players for the regular cycles. Normally the earth warms and the oceans give off CO2. It's been that way with all natural cycles as far as we can tell. Currently the oceans are serving as a giant sink for excess CO2 rather than giving off CO2. The accelerated melting of the ice packs, glaciers and polar ice caps has a tremendous stabilizing effect as each CC/gram of ice melting takes 100 calories. Nature's air conditioner is trying to hold the temperature down. That should stabilize at a higher temp once the North polar ice is gone and will go up more and faster as we lose each additional ice mass. Also as fresh water from the melting ice enters the oceans the "conveyor belts" will stop running. Who knows what that will do to the oceans ecological systems. Once the South polar ice cap shows even the beginnings of substantial melting we will be well past the point of no return. Just hope sea water temperature does not go high enough to release the Methane Hydrate deposits. Shallow deposits in the Arctic are already vaporizing in some areas just North and West of the US RUSSIAN border.
I thought everyone knew that. I guess I was wrong.
Regarding global warming: I am willing to contribute any amount, up to 25 cents, to save the planet from global warming. I strongly oppose all attempts to make me pay any more than that to combat what I consider a total fraud.
Of course, the nature of the people perpetrating this fraud contributed to my certainty that they are wrong.
Panaflex, do you know what projection is:
You claim that I'm highly irrational for ignoring real possible solutions, even though I state that I hope Savory is right about AGW. That's pretty irrational.
You claim that solutions are ignored, even though you ignore a carbon tax as somehow bad for the poor ("killing"). There is empirical evidence about that, and a body of theory that most economists agree with. YOU are the one ignoring possible solutions.
You claim that I'm ignoring "good" empirical evidence, when Savory does not have good empirical evidence with respect to AGW -- just a theory. And besides, YOU are the one ignoring good empirical evidence from economics regarding a carbon tax and also regarding the causes of AGW.
Projection, projection, projection. And you probably think you are smart than everyone else. That's projection too.