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Bill Nye: Climate Change Denial Is 'Running Out of Steam,' Thanks To Millennials (mic.com)
An anonymous reader shares with us an article on Mic: Famed science educator Bill Nye has long been an outspoken critic of people who continue to doubt climate change, the main driver of freaky weather patterns, rising global temperatures and sea level rise around the globe. In an interview with Mic, Nye said that despite lingering skepticisms, there is nearly 100% scientific consensus that climate change is happening and is here to stay -- and people are becoming increasingly anxious about its effects on the planet, particularly younger generations. "Almost every person in denial about climate change is older," Nye said. "It's very hard to find a millennial-aged person that is not concerned about climate change. I think the climate denial movement is running out of steam, I guess that's a pun."
I know just being picky, but no one doubts that climate change is behind changes in climate. I don't think anyone doubts climate change. Now perhaps some doubt anthropogenic climate change, technically this summary doesn't mention that.
This posting is provided 'AS IS' without warranty of any kind, implied or otherwise.
That's not actually a ringing endorsement.
ran out of steam 20 years ago.
Do you have ESP?
Now we just have to wait 30 more years for millennials to get into positions where they can do something about it.
Is this because Millennials are better at Science, or simply because they believe, what public school teachers told them?
In Soviet Washington the swamp drains you.
... explained this as "Science advances one funeral at a time." The longer version is more like, "A new scientific truth does not triumph by convincing its opponents and making them see the light, but rather because its opponents eventually die, and a new generation grows up that is familiar with it."
Concerned in that they will attend rallies and post on Facebook about it. But not concerned enough to stop driving automobiles or using Facebook. Everyone is so "concerned" about climate change, but the EU keeps emitting more and more CO2 every year. Why is that? They all claim to be "concerned" about it.
The game has been about money, which is where people hate and label people deniers. Everyone is supposed to pay a carbon tax to some unknown entity to sustain their current standard of living. In fact, the demand has not just been for paying off some unknown entity, but wealthier countries like the US, UK, Germany, etc.. all need to pay for previous generation of carbon.
We have massive amounts of pollution. We know it, but nobody will do anything. It's cheaper to dump and pay off people to look the other way than fix the problem. People making big piles of cash are not held accountable, and the politicians with greasy palms are not either.
Until we have a better solution than "give money to the people in shadows" people will argue and nothing will get done. Except that people like Bill Nye will still get paid very well to keep us arguing.
-The wise argue that there are few absolutes, the fool argues that there are no probabilities.
It's fine and good to question, but the best information we have says that there's a problem that needs attention. CO2 levels in the atmosphere were 280 ppm in the mid-18th century and now they're 402 ppm. We can hope that continuing increases won't have any severe consequences but it would be wise to consider the real possibility that they will.
The mass bulk of humanity, regardless of age, gives fuck all about 'climate change.'
It's what you concern yourself with when you have nothing real to be concerned about, and it's what you advocate sacrificing for when your aren't doing any actual sacrificing.
Be nice.
How would you feel if you were an engineer that couldn't get a job as an engineer so you have to pretend to be something else.
Deniers don't give a shit whether climate change is happening and don't care whether the science is correct. What 'deniers' are angry about, and what they are objecting to, is the obscene waste of public funds, the use of climate change as a justification for social engineering projects, and the utterly incompetent handling of the situation by governments. The term 'denier' is essentially used as a condescending replacement for 'objector'.
Climate change could have been addressed decades ago had we invested heavily in nuclear power, but the people who are frothing at the mouth ranting about climate change are the same people who have prevented the expansion of nuclear power. The very people who have created the climate change issue are chastising us telling us we need to destroy our economy and society by spending countless billions on inefficient, inconsistent and obscenely expensive renewable. 'Deniers' are sick of the idiocy, the hypocrisy and the waste, and rather than denying climate change, we're just not listening and we don't care.
The situation we have is basically this:
Environmentalist: Climate change is going to destroy the world! We must reduce our carbon output!!!
'Denier': How about we build some carbon neutral nuclear power plants? They're cheap, consistent and will solve the problem.
Environmentalist: No! We won't tolerate those filthy things! We'd rather burn coal and gas than have the satanic nuclear power!
'Denier': Fuck off then. If you're not going to be reasonable about this I just don't care any more.
For politicians and environmental groups aren't interested in solving the problem but instead just want to push forward their ideology. They want renewable energy, not because it will be effective at reducing climate change or because it's cheap, but for idealogical reasons. Politicians, particularly in the EU, want to use it as an excuse to bring tens of millions of people from Africa and the Middle East to Europe because they say that land will be unusable. Politicians want to use climate change as an excuse to raise taxes, because they believe in high taxation.
'Deniers' are sick of the whole situation. We're sick of effective solutions being rejected. We're sick of the abuse in the name of climate change. We're sick of your endless ranting about climate change but total inaction. We've reach a point where we're simply not listening. You've abused this situation to such an extent that we don't want to hear anything you have to say and we certainty won't do anything to help with your stupidity.
If you want to build nuclear power stations to resolve the problem, I'm all for it. With them in place we could take our time to develop efficient, cost effective renewable sources of energy. However, if you want to generate energy by hugging trees, if you want to tax the life out of us, if you want to destroy our lifestyle, if you want to destroy our nations by bringing "victims of climate change" into the country by the boat load, then fuck you! We will actively oppose anything you say or do!
ARGH ARGH ARGH ARGH ARGH!
Sick of making the same tired old post.
WE GET IT.
WE BELIEVE YOU.
Now what the FUCK would you like us to do about it that we're a) not already doing, b) will provably (or probably) make a measurable difference within a reason time, c) doesn't cost the (non-literal) Earth, d) that will get approval from those parties that need to do it?
Ignore all the name-calling and shit, let's assume we ALL agree it's happening. I'm of scientific mind, I can do that for any subject that I agree with or not.
But... Now what?
The argument is entirely pointless unless you can get every country to agree to cut emissions.
Earth : 4 Billion Years Of Climate Change... No one deny the changes... some argue the causes.
Wait, what? You're telling me that public school is pre-Vatican Two when it comes to diet?*
*Note, a quick googling revealed that the 2nd Vatican Council and fish Fridays has some subtlety to it. They didn't abolish fish fries, they just told Catholics to do some other penance if abstaining from meat was not a penance.
Anyway, unless you're sending your kids to private religious school, I don't know how you could have any kind of "God day" in public school in the US.
For all intensive purposes, "whom" is no longer a word. That begs the question, "who cares"?
Social and financial pressure to agree (or at least pretend to agree). Everyone is now too concerned about "getting Eich'ed" to take a stand against any of the typical left-liberal talking points. So, of course, the same left-liberals are going to harp on the consensus that they willed into existence through terror to defend their righteousness. In the end, they might be right...maybe. But undoubtedly the way the treated people on that road makes them pieces of shit.
OK, there's 100% consensus that climate change is happening. It's a fucking dynamic system, how can it be static?
HOWEVER, there is ZERO consensus that it is caused by human activity.
The sum total of human activity on this planet takes place in the lower 37,000 feet of the atmosphere, to a depth of about a thousand feet beneath the surface.
THERE IS MUCH MORE in the Universe than that seven and a half miles. A LOT more that directly affects this planet, to much larger extent than even our entire nuclear arsenals are capable of.
Vulcanism. Tectonics. Solar flares. Asteroids. Tidal forces. Precession. Whale farts.
Political debates have me rolling my eyes so much I think I got optical whiplash. I should sue. - Foamy The Squirrel
Bill Nye is an entertainer, not a scientist. Millennials are, by definition, young, inexperienced people. That young people believe what a TV personality tells them is not exactly a news flash.
"We receive as friendly that which agrees with, we resist with dislike that which opposes us" - Faraday
Castro is still alive. I think maybe you mean Stalin.
Anyway, it goes both ways. Many would argue that people who were born at the beginning of the 20th century were harder working, didn't believe they were "entitled" to various benefits and supported many of the ideals that this generation has forgotten.
Six of the ten biggest companies in the world are in the Oil & Gas Industries. The costs of global warming--literally, one planet--would bankrupt them if they ever actually had to pay for the damage in a lawsuit or under a new law.
It turns out that the dregs of those trillions of dollars buys not only protection from lawmakers, but that the lawmakers and related armies of talking heads will espouse the theories your pet "scientists" prepare as talking points, until even they no longer remember that you started those rumors. The stories about how good you are or how natural global warming is or about how government regulation of environmental protection is bad make it into the press (and your perspective jury pool) free of your fingerprints.
As a result, plenty of good people--even intelligent people who share the political beliefs of your army of lobbied lawmakers--come to believe that it's not your fault.
Poof, the anthropogenic nature of global warming and the needs for action and environmental regulation start going up in smoke. And you can keep burning your oil.
Clearly climate change is happening. We have enough data to assert that without question, unless you are a shill for the CO2 emitting industry or a jihad anti-climate change ideologist who uses this as a litmus test of blind allegiance.
I am still a "the world is coming to an end" skeptic, for many reasons:
One is that the press focuses on bad news because it attracts readership.
Another is because made up crises attract more funding. To give an example of a made up crisis on top of a real problem was last year's prediction by WHO of 1.4 million dead from Ebola. Actual deaths? About 11,000.
The third reason why I'm an end-of-the-world skeptic is Stein's law. If things do seem to become nearly apocalyptic we can expect that rapid, drastic action will be taken. E.g. the first time the Koch brothers mansion in the Hamptons gets flooded will see a very different tune coming from the GOP.
Fourth reason is because as a technologist I know that some seemingly insurmountable problems are often overcome via technology. E.g. the drop in the prices of solar cells has been much more dramatic that I had ever expected. Cost used to be the main problem with solar, not any more. Now it seems to be storage and lo an behold improvements in battery technology (power wall anyone) seem rather promising.
Fifth, the models are a hell of a lot more imprecise than the press lets you know. We *are* tickling the climate dragon, so we *will* get a reaction. What exactly will it be? pretty hard to tell just yet.
So every time some one predicts the end of the world be it Ebola, overpopulation, or global warming I put my skeptic hat on.
Having said that, I'm in favor of renewable energy and less CO2 production now because polluting less makes sense regardless of apocalyptic climate change or not.
And what if the liberals were right? How would you know it?
When non-climate scientists are critical of this consensus science we're told they have no standing because they're not climate scientists.
Maw! Fire up the karma burner!
Bill Nye (along with Al Gore) got caught faking a experiment to "prove" climate change - the results were totally not reproducible in any way and the footage he had was cut to make it look like it proved his claim (google "bill nye fake experiment" to see it exposed). Since then, I don't see why anyone listens to the guy. He's Bill Nye The Propaganda Guy
It seems every time there's 'proof' of man made global warming, the data is cooked, the experiments are not reproducible, the predictions don't materialize. Not sure how that state of affairs became the standard of "science".
Correction, if Castro was still in power.
As for your opposing world view, I believe it is garbage. Everyone always thinks "their" group was better.
What usually happens is that when group (A) is wrong, group A2 fixes the problem. But group A mostly can't admit they were wrong, so they claim the 'fix' that A2 did is really a problem.
Prime example is the 'entitled' feeling you discuss. It's roots is in the belief that rights are you actual rights, rather than privileges. As in , blacks are entitled to a fair trial, Jews are entitled to go to law school, women are entitled to an equal wage.
But if you disagree with the above entitlements, you get shouted down for being a racist, anti-Semitic misogynist.
So instead you complain about a generic "entitlement" culture of today's youths.
Similar thing happening now with the new sexual liberation. The backlash is about how we are 'oppressing' good honest Christians that just want to live by their sincere beliefs.
If your sincere beliefs are hateful, bigotry, then yes, we are not going to let you live by those beliefs - at least not to the extent that they infringe on other people's actual, real civil rights.
excitingthingstodo.blogspot.com
Exactly! Best reply I've read on Slashdot this week, s.petry.
The problem most people have with the climate change issue is that people with expensive agendas are found swirling all around it. There's lots of money on the table, waiting to be swept up by anyone proposing "environmentally Green energy alternatives" their business can supposedly provide. If you want to make sure that gravy train doesn't end, you've got to keep everyone fearful about the future and believing your solutions will save them.
The "carbon tax" thing isn't actually an inherently terrible idea. It falls apart in practice, though, because we simply don't have an equitable way to collect an appropriate amount of tax from everyone polluting and then spending it again on things that actually work to remove that much pollution again. All it does is help a few rich people get richer the more they can encourage people to continue contributing to the problem and then paying them to compensate for it.
The elephant in the room that many people choose to ignore is the fact that we've all collectively gotten so much benefit from the energy produced by the fossil fuels that are so despised. I don't know that it's remotely fair to make the oil, coal or gas company the "bad guy" who must pay for all the environmental damage the use of their fuels caused, when it was all of us willingly buying them or the energy produced by them, the whole time. There needs to be more recognition that fossil fuels helped advance society for everyone on this planet who could take advantage of them. And yes, it looks like that caused downsides we need to examine more closely and start addressing. But doing so may just involve accepting we're in for a slightly warmer climate, and relocating some people and buildings would be a good idea over the next 100 years.
What troubles me is the suddenness at which that phrase seemed to have been dropped by the media and "believers" in favour of the more generic term "climate change" that does not, somewhat conveniently, attribute a possible cause.
Do I believe "climate change" is happening? Yes, according to geological evidence it's happened at least four times before during planetary Ice Ages, we're probably about due a fifth Ice Age.
Do I believe man is the cause? Unsure, I don't think we've been able to measure our potential impact on the planet over a long enough period to make too many assumptions - we'd probably need to compare temperature measurements over the century before industrialisation to temperature measurements after industrialisation to make any reasonable assumptions. But we don't have that data.
Do I think burning less fossil fuels, recycling more and being green are worthwhile? Not everyone who smokes gets cancer but not smoking reduces the risk of cancer. I don't smoke because I want to minimise my risk of cancer, in the same way I am happy to be greener *in case* my carbon emissions are having a big impact on climate.
I don't see the above as being a doubter, I am happy to proceed with caution until empirical evidence proves things either way - and I don't think the proof exists for either way except that we are very confident that this planet went through at least four cooling/warming cycles before man was ever here. Therefore my opinion at the moment is climate change is more than likely natural, whilst keeping an open mind.
Windows 10 is great - I used it to download Linux.
It's very hard to find a millennial-aged person that is not concerned about climate change.
Of course Millennials are concerned about it. Modern school systems and society have basically indoctrinated Millennials in the belief of man-made climate change. Society often considers them to be fools or ignorant for even questioning the belief, instead of encouraging them to ask "why" and search for truths and data that supports or refutes climate change theories. Furthermore, Millennials have never been taught or seen the things that make some of the older people doubt the validity of claims related to global climate change.
The fact that Millennials believe in things related to climate change really has nothing to do with greater acceptance of scientific research. It is just a product of their upbringing.
Yeah, no.
Depends very much on what life looks like at 160, but as it is the human brain doesn't fully develop until mid-twenties, so that leaves about 30 or so good years of being in full control of your faculties.
Not really enough time to gain some wisdom and put it to good use.
I believe they saying "history repeats itself" is precisely because no one ever lives long enough to have a broad view, and certainly doesn't live long enough to come to terms with the follies of their youth and move towards something better.
Extending middle age will be one of the most dramatic shifts ever in our species, pushing intelligence further than even the web, and for the nihilist, forcing people to live with their decisions.
Here are four more times:
International Environmentalism: Flaunting White Privilege
Environmentalism is Political White Privilege
Whiteness and Sustainability: Reflecting on Race, Class, and Green Living
On Why the Environmental Movement is Failing to "Diversify"
The prols have noticed that "environmentalism" is an anxiety indulged almost exclusively by conformable white folk.
Maw! Fire up the karma burner!
Weather is not climate. For about the millionth time.
And as stated above, yes, the climate is changing.
How much of that is caused by man, and more importantly, how much will be caused by man in the next hundred years or so, has not been established. The models that purport to be predictive disagree with one another; disagree with the actual observed climate; offer no precursor climate event that shores up their ideas; suffer from precursor climate events that contradict their ideas; and are almost certain to be massively disrupted by technological change even if they were spot on WRT today's conditions anyway.
Aside from that, the obvious sane path is to contribute the least that is practical to changes in atmospheric gas mix, particulate levels, and temperature change. Solar and nuclear power are the two technologies that offer the best shot at reducing all of those. Solar is growing and advancing technologically at a very high rate, storage (a required facet of really solid general solar power supply) is behind but changing fast in the right direction, and nuclear... sigh. Nuclear is still suffering various slings and arrows that have little or no actual relevance today. Never underestimate the power of fear-mongering. They ever want to put a nuke in my back yard then PIIMBY (Put It In My Back Yard), I'll bake them a cake and move all my stuff out of the way.
I've fallen off your lawn, and I can't get up.
Because he's the only one saying it....
Oh wait, he isn't. Just about every climatologist out there is saying it.
The world's burning. Moped Jesus spotted on I50. Details at 11.
There is nothing like a few inconvenient facts to demonstrate how out of touch with reality a person's ideas are. Look at the numbers, there has not been a significant improvement in how humans are actually behaving with regards to the issue of climate change. There is no purer form of denial than actually ignoring advice completely, as if it was never given.
Every opinion poll taken says you're full of shit.
"Be particularly skeptical when presented with evidence confirming what you already believe." -
Imagine having people that used to own slaves still being able to vote today
You mean as opposed to having people that used to force people with black skin at the back of the bus still being able to vote today?
Probably pretty bad. I might take up chain smoking, ignoring the SCIENTIFIC CONSENSUS that's it's terrible for me and despite telling children not to smoke, waving my hand in front of my face as if I couldn't bear the smell.
The effect of increasing CO2 on temperature diminish logarithmically; unlikely to be severe. we might not even have enough fossil fuel left in the ground to get to severe..
Apocalypse Cancelled, Sorry, No Ticket Refunds
computer models that rely on dat athat stops prior to 1976 isn't evidence. That's a broken model.
Well, I guess it's a good thing that there are also people running models with modern data. But that wasn't even my point. The point is that all the tools and data are there to show how the consensus is wrong. And yet, nobody's doing that. If you think the model is broken, please fix it, and show your results. You'll be famous.
There is a middle ground between the consensus being wrong and the models being right.
We KNOW the last century has been warming.
We KNOW that CO2 concentration has been increasing.
We KNOW that CO2 is coming from our activities.
We KNOW that increased greenhouse gases will trap more energy and cause warming.
That's the consensus. Things like how bad things get by 2100 and what impact our changes in emissions will have are NOT well understood. It's the IPCC that says so too, so again that's also the consensus.
The models do NOT have strong evidence to help us predict the impacts of climate change. This is because the models CAN NOT realistically hind cast the global energy imbalance, let alone predict it. The IPCC states as much in the fifth AR: ...maintaining the global mean top of the atmosphere (TOA) energy balance in a simulation of pre-industrial climate is essential to prevent the climate system from drifting to an unrealistic state. The models used in this report almost universally contain adjustments to parameters in their treatment of clouds to fulfil this important constraint of the climate system
It's fundamental that the entirety of the physics beneath global warming is more energy being trapped leading to higher temperatures. When the models can NOT accurately hind cast this without being hand tuned, they are NOT able to predict the future impacts either.
That isn't saying models are worthless. Models are terrifically valuable in furthering our understanding of climate functions, and iterative improvements to this will get us to the point where they CAN hind cast energy imbalance on their own. Until they reach that benchmark though, we do not have a strong understanding of what impact future emission and change scenarios look like. We are vastly over stating our understanding to suggest otherwise.
Doesn't that depend on what you consider severe? I would consider permanent flooding of some coastal areas and more frequent flooding of others coastal areas to be severe. I'm not inclined to believe that humans are going to be wiped out by AGW but that doesn't mean lesser consequences aren't extremely serious.
Can we at least get an argument from Nye that isn't a variation of argumentum ad numerum?
Just the other day I had a conversation with an 11th grade student and a science teacher about global warming. Turns out, the students were doing a research essay on the subject, one page, and the teacher accepts every paper that's backed up with good sources. And they have a good conversation even evaluating some of the sources. He openly tells students that he firmly believes global warming is real, but it's an open dialog with students.
Not every school discourages open conversation regarding climate change. And I'm equally frustrated that there's just as much closed-minded fervor from both sides of the conversation.
In my study of the topic, I've concluded that climate change is happening, and humans are partially responsible for the change. But the Earth has ways of compensating for the change, though some of these compensations will necessitate either adaptations or extensions from all walks of human life. We humans have had such success in adapting to our environment that we should have no troubles adjusting, but ironically, we resist change. In order to adapt, we need to talk about the changes taking place and how to respond to them accordingly. That's becoming incredibly difficult; climate-change believers are so self-righteous, they feel humans need to take full responsibility for its existence and pretentiously claim we have to "undo" it all; and climate-change deniers don't want to accept any responsibility at all, especially due to the costs.
Climate is changing every moment of every day, and the complete calculus that is climate is so complex, it's nothing short of arrogance to think we alone are at fault. Milankovich cycles. Volcanic vents. Solar output. Water vapor. Not to mention butterflies, methane emissions from cattle (and don't forget buffalo), forest fires, surface volcanic eruptions, and who knows what else. The only explanation I have for taking a ~30 year warming trend within the billions of years of our planet's existence and constituting it as a global crisis is because we humans like to imagine that we're in control of this world. But we're not.
It angers me even further that, just because there's so much in this world that we do not and cannot control, there's no good reason -not- to do what we can to clean up our planet. Until we can find another one to take its place, and find a way to get a subset of the human population there, this is the only one we have. So let's not fuck it up.
citation?
the only acceptable solutions involve other people making sacrifices while said idiots continue to do whatever they want.
Climate change deniers are a symptom of the larger problem. We have in the United States a wholesale attack against science in general. Fracking causing earth quakes and contaminating ground water, intelligent design, global warming, corporations have human rights, are just a few of the battle fronts in this war. The purchasing of propaganda power of largest ½ dozen companies in the world combined allow them to do anything – change any law, commit any crime, plunder any resource in any country anywhere on the planet. Anyone with a contrary view must be discredited at any cost. The only way to reverse the trend in the US is to change how the election process is funded. Make politicians accountable to voters not oligarchy who currently buy and sell them. Members of today’s oligarchy were once idealistic Woodstock goers. Just as today millennials will grow into responsibility and power and they too will do what it takes to keep the status quo and silence opposing opinions.
Oh millennials, is there anything you can't fuck up?
Now if they phrased it such that "the weather is being oppressed by culturally-appropriated microaggressions", you'd see them all rally around the cause and tweet tirelessly until #ClimateChange was fixed.
Just cruising through this digital world at 33 1/3 rpm...
Gallup's regular poll of the Most Important Problem doesn't even have Climate Change on the list.
Browsing at +1 - no ACs, I ignore their posts. So refreshing!
Are you attempting to claim that Phillip Morris had one owner, and that owner only owned that one business, and when tobacco sales started to dry up they owner became destitute and died poor?
How do you live with absolutely no depth perception?
-The wise argue that there are few absolutes, the fool argues that there are no probabilities.
Climate has been changing radically, warming, cooling and everything else in between since earth had an atmosphere. Who could possibly imagine that just because humans are so populous now that the laws of millions of years of nature would suddenly stop? We really, really don't matter in the grand scheme of things. Earth, biological life and climate changes existed long before we showed up and they will exist long after we disappear.
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Instead of pointing out the problem I suggest we start pointing out solutions.
Why are coal miners even in business? I mean if global warming is a problem, and burning coal makes it worse, then shouldn't we see coal miners find something else to do? We see coal miners in business because people want cheap electricity. Without something that can provide electricity as cheap as coal we will burn coal.
We don't burn coal because we want global warming. We burn coal because we like hot pizza in the winter, ice cream in the summer, air conditioned movie theaters, computers, cell phones, and all the other things that cheap electricity can bring us. What alternatives do we have? Wind is cheap but we can't rely on the wind to blow. Solar power costs double or quadruple what coal power costs. If we burned wood for electricity then we'd have made the land barren long ago.
Bill Nye is an engineer, he's studied this stuff in school and for his job. For a product to sell it must be on time, on budget, meet fit/form/function, and be better than the other guys' products. Do we have anything that can do that? Yes, nuclear fission.
Instead of saying the same thing over and over again about how climate change is "undeniable" I say we start talking about how to fix this. Barring some leap in technology the only solution we have is nuclear fission. So I say we need to talk about how we are going to build nuclear power plants at a rate sufficient to replace coal and meet future demand.
I am armed because I am free. I am free because I am armed.
What young people have been propagandized to "know" is NOT any indicator of the validity of what they have been taught to regurgitate.
This mindless moron, who is only a scientist on TV while talking to children, could have said the exact same thing about Jews in 1943 Germany. He could have celebrated the idea that all the young were in agreement that Jews were untermenschen and that, happily, the demographics and the efforts of herr Goebels had combined to make it that only a minority of older Germans still held the wrong-headed idea the Jews were human beings. Throw about a Godwin label if you like, but the example is perfectly valid, and I am NOT calling Nye a NAZI, just highlighting how bad the argument is and how it could be used to support the worst of things.
It's very amusing to watch the high-priests of the church of AGW use an endless supply of irrational arguments and sneaky dishonest political tactics to try to prop-up the faith and reassure each other. Even the labels they use are fallacies and political tactics rather then the tools of science which they only pretend to use. They label critics "deniers", seek to banish them from the scientific paper publishing and peer review processes, eliminate them from educational institutions, etc. I just cannot seem to recall the details of the time that Einstein labelled all his critics "deniers" and tried to get them banned......
No, it was an open-ended question: what do you think is the most important problem facing this country today? You didn't even read the page, did you? Respondents could answer with ANYTHING. The fact that climate change/global warming doesn't even show up - AT ALL - shows that it's really not a concern for the vast majority of people.
Browsing at +1 - no ACs, I ignore their posts. So refreshing!
The problem is not if Millennials are concerned or not.
The problem is that people that are way older and *see* the climate change are to *blind* to realize it.
Cost free eBook I read (by iBook/Kobo/Amazon/ObookO/Gutenberg etc.): "The Green Odyssey" by Philip Jose Farmer.
Perhaps you should look at the equation?
It is logarithmic but for all practical purpose it is more or less linear at the levels we have right now.
Cost free eBook I read (by iBook/Kobo/Amazon/ObookO/Gutenberg etc.): "The Green Odyssey" by Philip Jose Farmer.
And????
The world's burning. Moped Jesus spotted on I50. Details at 11.
I thought AGW was going to result in more steam, not less. So they are saying we are cooling off?
Have gnu, will travel.
Just wait a few more years and global cooling will be back. Obviously, the term 'climate change' will still apply.
Excuse me, but please get off my Pennisetum Clandestinum, eh!
Growing up, I used to believe in global warming. Then I started learning about growing crops, solar energy, and the first law of thermodynamics. Increasing atmospheric CO2 concentration improves performance of the C3 photosynthesis engine predominately used by most plants. When plants can convert more sunshine to biomass, less sunshine is converting into heat (first law of thermodynamics). This means there is an inherent counteracting force steering us away from run-away global warming. Al Gore, Bill Nye, etc -- these guys PROFIT from people believing their global warming propaganda. Long before humans showed up, the planet had much higher CO2 concentrations than we have today, and that is why C3 photosynthesis was adopted by most plant life compared to CAM and C4 photosynthesis that doesn't benefit as much from high CO2 concentrations. The C3 plants thrived and the planet survived to produce humans.
Plant fruits, nuts, vegetables, shade trees, and solar panels around your house. Forget about global warming and tell the propagandists to go to hell with their pseudo-science crap.
I'm probably a but too old to be a millennial. At a minimum I am on the older end of the millennial spectrum. I can recall seeing the shift in teaching about global warming. Now that I've gone back to college I find myself surrounded by the younger end of the millennial spectrum I find the difference in my earlier education quite profound.
Way back then I remember people openly mocking global warming and no one would say a word. Now you have people, seemingly seriously, calling openly for punishment of deniers. Some say the global warming deniers are such a threat that the death penalty should be imposed. I did not expect a Spanish Inquisition.
I'm studying mathematics in college (or rather a narrow branch of it) and I find my computer science professors taking class time to lecture on global warming. In statistics class I find nearly half of the class examples being about temperature, snowfall, ice sheet mass, rainfall, or some other climate phenomenon. (Much of the rest is on some racial, gender, social status, or something else to feed social justice warriors. A small portion of the class examples are on things like material strength, rock composition, or something else politically neutral.)
I'm in my fourth semester and I find that only the math professors seem content to keep their political beliefs to themselves. Oh, and the music instructors but that's an elective, not required for my course plan.
It's no wonder that millennials think global warming is a problem, they've been told it is in every class they took from kindergarten to graduate school. With the possible exception of courses like math and music like I've seen.
Oh, wait, I do recall politics coming up in music class. We got on the topic of old musical instruments and that lead to the discussion of certain woods being a problem politically and things like ivory and bone which may have come from endangered species.
Now that I say this I may have jinxed myself and politics will come up in math class tomorrow.
Also, way back when the problems were acid rain, polluted waters, deforestation, ozone layer depletion, and other such problems that rarely come up any more since we've basically solved those problems. I have to wonder if the people that fought for those things back then feel a need to keep fighting and will cling to anything, even if that something doesn't exist.
I am armed because I am free. I am free because I am armed.
The longest journey starts with the first step. Is it better to start making incremental changes now or wait until we can fix it all instantly?
To be fair Obama and any President doesn't have a choice about using Air Force One. The security apparatus and communication needs of a President preclude that.
No surprise that older people are more skeptical. In fact, that's kind of a silly observation.
Of course they are! They've had decades more experience in being served BS and are more aware of the fact that some people will intentionally mislead other people for personal gain.
Once upon a time the phrase was, "[The young] are more impressionable." Well, yeah. There was another: "If you are not a socialist when you are young, you have no heart. If you are still a socialist when you are old, you have no brain." So be a climate activist when you are young, and when you get old well you'll be wiser ... and seen as the 'doubter' for whatever the youth issue of the future is.
"Consensus" in science is _always_ a political construct.
The scaremongering serves the politicians. it justifies them getting more power, more money, and people owing them more favors.
I've decided to stop wasting my time responding to AC trolls/sockpuppets... so if you want a response from me... login.
Your right of course, right now they are saying most of the warming is in the Arctic, if that means it's up to -25 instead of the more typical -35 winter temperatures, I don't see that having a lot of practical physical significance; however if it starts hitting 0 earlier in the spring and the Tmax is a couple degrees higher all summer, you have a different situation. The Arctic is a tough nut for climatologist, the historical record isn't as accurate as they would have you believe. DEW line radar jockeys getting paid basically minimum wage, aren't the most reliable about going outside where you can freeze to death in minutes or get eaten by a polar bear to read a thermometer when they can just sit in the ready room and just write down whatever they feel like. Even satellite coverage isn't the best over the Arctic.
There have been plenty of predictions of an ice free Arctic and 20m increases in sea-level that haven't panned out.
Apocalypse Cancelled, Sorry, No Ticket Refunds
Really?? We are supposed to respect the opinions of a bunch of whimpering babies that can't stand the sight of a Trump sticker on their campus without running in fear?? People who have signed petitions to ban the first amendment??
I suppose if Mr. Nye is desperate enough to look anywhere for support, he'll turn to anyone. Even the chronically clueless...
I rarely read replies, it's my opinion and if you thought about your opinion a little more, I'm OK with that.
If you believe in climate change, yet still drive anywhere other than work, or fly for any reason other than to support yourself, I don't really see how you can in good conscience look at anyone else. You haven't done all that YOU can do yet. Until you have, I don't care what you're cop-outs are, people are not going to listen to you. And that's the problem. Climate change is everyone else's fault. Always.
It's not the environmentalists criss-crossing the world in private jets to attend climate change conferences. Oh no. No no. Perish the thought. Academia's farts don't stink, nor do their vehicles emit pollution. Instead, they emit magic pixie dust. It's those gosh-darn working-class and unfashionable other-party industries.
Would you believe the Democrats take more annual airplane flights than Republicans, as well as fly more miles? Shhhhhhhhh. I won't tell if you don't. Those gosh-darn working-class southerners and their oil farmers whose products the liberal elite use more than anyone!
I do not own a car, nor have a flow in over 10 years. So, you'd think the climate change proponents would love me, right? Nope. They could not care less what my carbon footprint is (the bottom 1% of all Americans). Could not care less. They are upset because I don't talk about climate change and parrot their views.
Any you wonder why it doesn't get better?
It's because its most vocal advocates are insincere. Think about it. The people who are "too selfish" to have kids (their words), care deeply about what happens to the planet once they're dead and buried.
Why?
Why would they do that?
Why would proud, openly-selfish people give a damn about the well-being of people 10 generations from now? Generations they will not even be contributing to?
Well, they wouldn't care. They only reason they'd give a damn about global warming, were if it somehow benefitted them to pretend to give a damn about it.
Oh, but not you, though. You care so much about the people who will be alive 100 years from now because that's just who you are as a human being.
Okay, what about the homeless we have living on the streets today? We have more than enough money in this country to house everyone. Why do some people care more about climate discomfort when they no longer exist, than the do about needy people right now? Why do you always need to wait for a bandwagon to care about a problem? Why do you always wait until it brings you kudos and pats on the head before getting worked up about an issue? There are so many worthy issues not in the public eye right now, can you name three of them?
Why, exactly, do we need consensus on climate change when the affluent-class could make a HUGE difference just by themselves? IF everyone who believes that climate change was an issue, stopped driving and flying tomorrow, that would in and of itself, if not solve it, make great strides.
But they don't. Instead, they say it's your fault, or their fault, or someone's fault, then they fly home for mom's pumpkin pie. Yummy!
What you are witnessing is yet another ruling-class, neo-puritan moral-panic. It's not about climate change, it's about them. If you want to know what people really care about, pay no attention to what they say. Instead, watch what they do.
If you do, you will come to the conclusion that those who actually care about it talk less and do more.
It's not about what you do, though. It's about what you say. Snark, snark, sarcasm, snark. Climate change proponents are rich in snark. They'll tell you with the wit of Lorne Michaels why "the others" are oh-so-lame.
If only snark, sarcasm, and insults solved the problem (climate change proponent's primary solution to the issue), it would be solved. You care about humankind so much that you run around calling
First of all, plate tectonics has been the leading theory for over a half a century now, so it's a lot fucking longer than "a few decades" ago, a rhetorical trick you employed to make it sound like a young theory.
Second of all, so what? So a new theory was developed as new data came along. That's what AGW is. Mind you, the actual fundamental aspect of AGW, that increasing CO2 concentrations in the lower atmosphere will lead to more energy being trapped in the lower atmosphere, goes back over a century.
So here's a challenge for you, when you're not trying to make crap analogies and pointless asides into some sort of grand argument against a science you don't like. Where the fuck is that energy going if it isn't heating up the lower atmosphere, surface temperatures and the ocean? If you're going to assert the underlying theory is faulty, then you need to explain how the physics is wrong. Are you going to now claim that a thermodynamics is wrong? Are you going to claim that CO2 absorption and re-emission patterns are wrong?
All we have here is another moron who thinks he's got a killer argument against AGW, but this isn't even an argument against AGW, it's a vague claim that somehow because one branch of science, half a century ago, produced a new theory, that any day now, science will supplant AGW.
The world's burning. Moped Jesus spotted on I50. Details at 11.
>Sun's total energy that hits the Earth surface is 25 000 Terawats of heat energy every year.
Exactly. And the amount of CO2 in the atmosphere is a big factor in how much of that energy is captured in the atmosphere. Despite your parents unqualified personal opinions on what constitutes a greenhouse gas or what it even means. The two biggest components in our atmosphere, Oxygen and Nitrogen, are NOT greenhouse gases.
If you don't believe that these same people can accurately forecast the general trends 50 years from now, however, you're an "idiot". A "moron" even. A redneck, probably poor, but definitely, oh DEFINTELY unfashionable.
I got called similar things last week during a discussion about gender issues. Before class began, a group of UW Students informed me that gender was a 100% social construct, and had no basis in science whatsoever. I do not exaggerate, this was, verbatim, their claim. When I mentioned chromosomes being the primary thing that determines gender, they called me, well you know ... they ridiculed me.
Then, one of them said something like "I bet you don't believe in climate change either!"
I'll let that stand on it's own.
Yeah, but he does have a choice of constantly travelling to California, shutting down roads and disrupting traffic, etc. for fundraising only. And yes, I know, "his campaigning will elect people even BETTER at helping the environment, blah blah blah".
There seem to be Orwellian rules for applying the term "denier." I don't deny the UAH satellite data.
UAH satellite data
Do you deny the UAH satellite data?
That that is is that that that that is not is not.
You're claiming the UAH satellite data isn't legitimate scientific evidence?
UAH satellite data
I do not deny the UAH satellite data. Do you?
That that is is that that that that is not is not.
Because he is a giant douched and his douchiness pushes me away from proselytizing about climate change/agw/whatever the fuck they are going to call it next. Look, I don't care if global warming is occurring. I really don't. I have no fear of it and it's a dumb thing to even talk about.
I'm sure Nye (Cocteau) is right, the Millennials have been taught/conditioned to believe anything a person in position of authority says. It's really quite sad. Skeptics are needed and necessary. https://www.youtube.com/watch?...
You'd have a better argument if he was doing any different than other Presidents.
Noting that millennials care more about Facebook/Instagram etc, the Kardashians (and other "celebrities") than they care about most anything else speaks volumes.
Climate has been changing on this planet since the planet formed. What is his point?
I don't think your grasping the concept of logarithms properly, it's more of a calculus thing than a arithmetic thing. Equilibrium Climate Sensitivity is how many degrees of temperature change we would expect for each doubling of the amount of CO2 in the atmosphere. If Climate Sensitivity is 2, (a middle of the road value); and we have 280 ppm (a generally excepted value for pre-industrial levels); then you would expect a 2 degree when CO2 hit 360 ppm, another 2 degrees when CO2 hits 720 ppm. Each 2 degrees require twice as much CO2; there is no linear area, it might look that way when graphed, but if you look at the scale, the numbers are not equally spaced, they are logarithmically scaled
Apocalypse Cancelled, Sorry, No Ticket Refunds
Yes it's warming up. It's been warming up for over 1000 years. Not man's fault. Even NASA is distancing themselves from the bullshit some of their "scientists" have put out there - https://www.rt.com/news/338810... . If Turkey can tell you're full of crap, isn't it a bit obvious guys?
BTW, understand that Bill Nye isn't a scientist. He just plays one on TV. Check out his bio.
If we go through every planet in our solar system which have very different chemistries... and factor for distance from the sun AND air pressure... you can estimate the temperature at that pressure and distance within a reasonable margin of error. This suggests the chemistry isn't especially important. We've sent space probes to these worlds. How do you explain this?
Venus is as hot as it is because its atmosphere is very much denser and the planet is closer to the sun. Both qualities increase temperature. Factor for both and the temperature falls to something you wouldn't find unusual on earth despite having an atmosphere almost entirely composed of "greenhouse" gases.
We can go over the theories in detail but I am familiar with the science and the equations. I have found precious few would be sages on this issue that actually understand the science in any real detail. Most of them repeat political blogs or quote abstracts without understanding how anything is actually being calculated.
There are many problems with the fundamental theory much less the data. I am not a child. An explanation that involves cartoons and no actual explanation of methodology is not acceptable.
Again, the world is warming and the oceans are rising. No question. But they were doing that before the industrial revolution.
I'm not giving you trillions of dollars and dictatorial control over global industry on this basis. Try again.
I've decided to stop wasting my time responding to AC trolls/sockpuppets... so if you want a response from me... login.
Just drop a https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thermobaric_weapon in Antarctic Ice Sheets. You'll REBOOT the planet.
Casteism
It does, however, have environment/pollution on the list.
When will people start talking about the real 'unscientific' remedies being touted as 'solutions'. You don't need to be much of a scientist to recognize these politically motivated economic changes are basically more about rewarding industries with political ties than providing real scientific facts to show these or any actions can have a measurable effect on halting or reversing the stated effect. Try getting some research funded for that and you will see this is all a political charade.
Bill Nye and the Numbskull who posted a comment about his views on April 7th, 2016, raised my ire and demanded a response. There are very few people who hold the view that there is no such thing as climate change. There are plenty, however, unlike Nye and his ilk, who are un-fanatical enough to see, realize, admit, that it is not only possible, but essential,. to realize that it is not human causation (sometimes called anthropomorphic Global Warming (AGW) causing climate change. Such claims are non-scientific, foolish and, may I say it, stupid. The Global Warming Cabal has attempted to and, has fairly successfully, yelled down, victimized, pilloried and witch-hunted anyone who does not swallow the cool-aid of AGW. There are not only many, many, scientists, but many others as well, who are, for some reason, able to see that the AGW hypothesis is goofy and tragically flawed. These people, of whom I am one, for some reason have managed to maintain their sanity in an insane world. Remember the devastation caused to many fellow humans by the thoroughly discredited ideas and proponents of society being devastated by witchcraft and devil worship, or by Satanically-influenced child abuse, or even by an epidemic of deadly cholesterol caused by eating eggs, or by 'recovered' memories of long past sexual exploitation. AGW and these other witch hunts are on a par, but the longest lasting delusion of AGW wins the anti-prize.
I forgot to add one important fact: The vaunted millenial-aged cohort that 'unquestionably' believes in AGW according to Bill Nye and his supporters were probably the ones that voted in the Canadian federal Liberal party and their leader Justin Trudeldumb because he promised to legally legitimize marijuana use in Canada. What a reason to suddenly get interested in politics. Who cares that his policies will likely bankrupt Canada! Naive fools abound.