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Calliso
Guest
I think what it comes down to is people think well as long as I have those resources who cares about people in the future they can find something else!
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stevegravy
Guest
Here we go again.
First off a CO2 molecule emitted from a wood burning fireplace in Walawala, Washington is equal to a CO2 molecule from some coal fire in a human plastination factory in Beijing, China as far as what affect, if any, it will have on average global temperatures. So if you think it has to be hands off the third world countries burning fossil fuels then CO2 emissions must not be all that bad for the old planet. Or are you posting that they are only bad depending on who’s emitting them. If CO2 emissions are really so darn terrible why has there been no hydroelectric dams or nuclear power plants built in the USA in the last decade? Is it because the very same political types who spout off about global warming are the same ones who are blocking these projects for environmental reasons?
And besides who says the richer counries ought to be anybodies role model. This particular country has a hard enough time these days trying to do anything. It can not build a dam for hydroelectric energy production, nor build a refinery, or build oil wells were no one will ever see them, or build a nuclear reactors…… and you think we should be a good example, like nations can be parents to other nations. Who would follow such a lead in how not to get anything done?
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stevegravy
Guest
It may sound harsh but that is exactly what has kept the world inventing all along in the first place. The argument for peak oil is specious at best and even if it were true then there would come along alternate resources that human beings using there God given intellects will figure out how to use to overcome the limitations of scarcity. You may not believe it but review the history of development and inventions and you will find it has been driven by people trying to do more, faster, and cheaper. If you let them make a profit doing it, it will work out just fine. 6 billion people deciding what is best for themselves is a powerful tool. But governments have to get out of the way.
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SoCalRC
Guest
As Catholics, the matter is clear. We need only to look to the Pope. Climate change is, in his words, a right to life issue impacting billions of people.
Further, he warned that our Christian obligation is to truth, not politics.
The preponderance of scientific evidence is clear and almost universally accepted. Just 5 years ago, the fossil fuel funded think tanks coud throw out little $2-5K rewards and get relatively serious academics to write contrarian articles. Now, even 30-50K won’t buy a paper from a remotely credible source.
If you are, say, a radio talk show host, you can squawk stupidity with little effect on your long term career prospects. But an academic needs at least some legitimate scientific doubt for cover. Once it reaches the point that only the lunitic fringe do not except the evidence, the amount of money involved has to match one’s whole career, because that is what one is throwing away.
This ‘debate’ reminds me of the utter incoherence of modern US conservatism (and I am saying this as someone old enough to remember what being an Ike Republican was all about).
What is the key to national security? Less dependance on a foreign resource that is from an unstable region of the world.
What is the key to runaway health care costs? How about asthma, PDD, and auto immune disorders going down, not up to start?
Want to help the poorest people on the planet? How about giving them the opportunities of the industrialized age without having to go through the ugly, filthy aspects if industrialization - you know, the ones that left us with permanently poisoned water supplies and multi billion dollar public funded cleanups…
The list goes on and on. But somehow, when you actually connect logical efforts on national security, public health, future financial security, and self sustainable foreign aide to something remotely eco friendly, people who otherwise claim to support those general objectives go crazy…
Further, he warned that our Christian obligation is to truth, not politics.
The preponderance of scientific evidence is clear and almost universally accepted. Just 5 years ago, the fossil fuel funded think tanks coud throw out little $2-5K rewards and get relatively serious academics to write contrarian articles. Now, even 30-50K won’t buy a paper from a remotely credible source.
If you are, say, a radio talk show host, you can squawk stupidity with little effect on your long term career prospects. But an academic needs at least some legitimate scientific doubt for cover. Once it reaches the point that only the lunitic fringe do not except the evidence, the amount of money involved has to match one’s whole career, because that is what one is throwing away.
This ‘debate’ reminds me of the utter incoherence of modern US conservatism (and I am saying this as someone old enough to remember what being an Ike Republican was all about).
What is the key to national security? Less dependance on a foreign resource that is from an unstable region of the world.
What is the key to runaway health care costs? How about asthma, PDD, and auto immune disorders going down, not up to start?
Want to help the poorest people on the planet? How about giving them the opportunities of the industrialized age without having to go through the ugly, filthy aspects if industrialization - you know, the ones that left us with permanently poisoned water supplies and multi billion dollar public funded cleanups…
The list goes on and on. But somehow, when you actually connect logical efforts on national security, public health, future financial security, and self sustainable foreign aide to something remotely eco friendly, people who otherwise claim to support those general objectives go crazy…
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Oscarthecat
Guest
Why would anyone want less developed countries to develop by repeating (what some call) our mistakes?
Wouldn’t it make more sense for the global warming worriers to do everything they could to ensure that developing countries base their entire energy infrastructure on methods that are “better” for the environment?
After all, that way, China’s development, for example, would be “green” from the ground up, right?
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stevegravy
Guest
No organism can live in its own filth. It’s enviornment has to be cleaned and constantly refreshed. Thank God for all those not so well understood cycles and I’ll grant every tree hugger that much. But, in an industrial age it has to be done carefully so as to not kill the goose that lays the golden egg. Our problems are technical and it is only through technology that they will be solved. Not by some tax and spend carbon credit scheme that will only fatten governments coffers giving bureaucrats more control over our lives impoverishing everyone along the way. . The human race crawled out of the caves 25,000 years ago and I for one don’t want to send it back.As Catholics, the matter is clear. We need only to look to the Pope. Climate change is, in his words, a right to life issue impacting billions of people.
Further, he warned that our Christian obligation is to truth, not politics.
I say amen to that but, there has been more conjecture, hypothesizing assuming and politicizing over anthropogenic carbon emissions and global warming then you can shake a stick at.
The preponderance of scientific evidence is clear and almost universally accepted.
I wouldn’t go that far some folks wouldn’t agree. All I will say is the theory of anthropogenic caused climate change is quite involved very complicated way beyond my time constraints to fully understand also I will say from the readings I have done you need to suspend belief in the first laws of thermo(g_damn)namics, mass and energy balances. There are CO2 cycles, O2 cycles, S cycles, P cycles, CH4 cycles and they all say the same thing a 6 fold that is 600% increase in the generation of CO2 on the burning and decay arrow inside the CO2 cycle generates only a 40% increase in the atmosphere CO2. To say CO2 changing from 280 ppm to 360ppm making a 4000 mi thick ball of molten rock heat up a ½ of degree C at the surface when its interior is 5600 degree Kelvin give or take a couple hundred degrees is not all that impressive even if the heat radiated from the core at 45 TW is only 1/20, 000 that of what is radiated by the sun.Just 5 years ago, the fossil fuel funded think tanks coud throw out little $2-5K rewards and get relatively serious academics to write contrarian articles. Now, even 30-50K won’t buy a paper from a remotely credible source.
In my lifetime I have seen a lot of garbage reports put out by PhDs that was just plain wrong. But, I work in industry now why should I believe PhDs in government and academia are any better.
If you are, say, a radio talk show host, you can squawk stupidity with little effect on your long term career prospects. But an academic needs at least some legitimate scientific doubt for cover. Once it reaches the point that only the lunitic fringe do not except the evidence, the amount of money involved has to match one’s whole career, because that is what one is throwing away.
This ‘debate’ reminds me of the utter incoherence of modern US conservatism (and I am saying this as someone old enough to remember what being an Ike Republican was all about).
What is the key to national security? Less dependance on a foreign resource that is from an unstable region of the world.
So why are we not building nuclear power plants, hydroelectric dams and drilling off the coast and in Alaska?
What is the key to runaway health care costs? How about asthma, PDD, and auto immune disorders going down, not up to start?
What are you claiming raising CO2 levels from 280 ppm to 360 ppm brings on all these ailments?
Want to help the poorest people on the planet? How about giving them the opportunities of the industrialized age without having to go through the ugly, filthy aspects if industrialization - you know, the ones that left us with permanently poisoned water supplies and multi billion dollar public funded cleanups…
Like China and India?
The list goes on and on. But somehow, when you actually connect logical efforts on national security, public health, future financial security, and self sustainable foreign aide to something remotely eco friendly, people who otherwise claim to support those general objectives go crazy…
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Oscarthecat
Guest
I was waiting for this declaration to rear its ugly head. I’ve noticed you are prone to declaring that the facts are clear, and that anyone who disagrees with you is simply ignorant of the facts.
There is a only preponderance of interpretations of evidence, but science is not a democracy- something isn’t “right” just because more scientists agree on it. Regardless of what you say, the evidence is certainly open to numerous interpretations, not to mention the wide range of conflicting theories about what to do to fix the problem, and whether proposed solutions might actually cause more harm to the environment, not to mention to human beings, than help.
Where would we be now if we had followed the advice of the majority of scientists 30 years ago? Back then, the preponderance of scientific evidence indicated global cooling- they declared that anyone who disagreed with their position was simply ignorant of the facts, or being influenced by political interests.
Scientists called for an international effort to “fix” global cooling by covering large portions of the antarctic ice with black soot for the purpose of melting it to offset the massive amounts of ice growth they expected to see by the 1990’s.
Great idea in hindsight, right?
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Newbie2
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thomfra
Guest
Agree totally! I am not saying “china should pump out C02” because everybody else has. I was just pointing out that economic growth (at the moment) is linked with an increase in C02 output.
If we leave China out of the equation for a moment, who are a special case due to their sheer size:
It would be hard to say to a third world country, whose people live in poverty, and actually emitt very little C02 because nobody can afford a car, plough their fields with oxen, to be given the task of reducing C02 output by 10%. This would have a very big impact on developement for them. i.e. just getting electricity and street lighting for some countries would double their C02 output.
But 10% reduction for say germany, or USA, may well be achievable without any effect on quality of life.
We have to maybe let the poor countries develop, to get some basic living standards, (of course encouraging the use of renewables etc), but the rich larger polluters need to make a concerted effort to reduce C02 output. Americans don’t need to emitt twice the amount of C02 per person than europeans for example.
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thomfra
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What exactly is it that you have doubts about. What are they based on?
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mesurman
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Alternative Energy. Global Warming is not real. We should use any rescource available to us. I did not say abuse what we have, just not feel guilty about it. You read way too much into my post.
We should conserve as much as possible and reduce our dependency on foreign oil and investigate and create alternative energy sources. Heck, we are Americans, we always rise to the challenge and get things done. In that vain we already help the rest of the world with food and money and support whenever there is a problem. Your reply has a distinct air of arrogance and snobbery to anyone who does not believe the same things as you,
and I believe the word is “Pray” not “prey”, two completely different meanings.
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thomfra
Guest
I can assure you that I have quite a good command of the English language (by the way “resource” has only one c). Silly isn’t it. Trying to win points on such trivia speaks volumes about the fragility of your argument.
By the way: America gives (per capita i.e. a percentage of the GDP) comparitively little to help the poor of the world.
Now lets get back on topic: What exactly is it that you don’t believe? I can only assume that you have read papers from both sides. Who have you read from the “global warming exists is a problem side”, and what specific part of the data are you struggling to reconcile yourself with.
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mesurman
Guest
Sorry for the typographical error. My Bad. I am not struggling with anything. I have a college degree in Natural Resources Management, I have read paper from all sides. Global Warming is not man-made! What we have been experiencing are natural weather cycles, just look at geologic history and see for yourself. This is not the first time the planet has experienced either an increase or decrease in temperatures. Your use of the work prey insinuates that I am preying on people less fortunate than myself, you sir are an #######.
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thomfra
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Well - I ask again. Which specific papers do you have problems with? Which assumptions in the models do you disagree with?
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Caesar517
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Where did you hear that? Last I heard, America gives 1.7% of our Real GDP to charity, twice that of the country in second place.
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thomfra
Guest
Americans] are regularly told by politicians and the media, that America is the world’s most generous nation. This is one of the most conventional pieces of ‘knowledgeable ignorance’. According to the OECD, the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development, the US gave between $6 and $15 billion in foreign aid in the period between 1995 and 1999. In absolute terms, Japan gives more than the US, between $9 and $15 billion in the same period. But the absolute figures are less significant than the proportion of gross domestic product (GDP, or national wealth) that a country devotes to foreign aid. On that league table, the US ranks twenty-second of the 22 most developed nations. As former President Jimmy Carter commented: ‘We are the stingiest nation of all’. Denmark is top of the table, giving 1.01% of GDP, while the US manages just 0.1%. The United Nations has long established the target of 0.7% GDP for development assistance, although only four countries actually achieve this: Denmark, 1.01%; Norway, 0.91%; the Netherlands, 0.79%; Sweden, 0.7%. Apart from being the least generous nation, the US is highly selective in who receives its aid. Over 50% of its aid budget is spent on middle-income countries in the Middle East, with Israel being the recipient of the largest single share.
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thomfra
Guest
For the sceptics amongst us:
Suggest that we use the only trully ubiased group for further discussion. Namely the intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. They don’t do any reasearch. Only assess the reasearch which has been done objectively.
The full reports are availible for your reading pleasure at ipcc.ch/.
When you are finished reading through those, you can come back and contribute. There might be a bit more “meat on the bone” for further discussion. Newbie, you are of course allowed to print them out and read while you sit on your water saving toilet if you prefer
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Caesar517
Guest
Do you have a source for this? A link maybe?
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mesurman
Guest
For the sceptics amongst us:
Suggest that we use the only trully ubiased group for further discussion. Namely the intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. They don’t do any reasearch. Only assess the reasearch which has been done objectively.
The full reports are availible for your reading pleasure at ipcc.ch/.
When you are finished reading through those, you can come back and contribute. There might be a bit more “meat on the bone” for further discussion. Newbie, you are of course allowed to print them out and read while you sit on your water saving toilet if you prefer
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mesurman
Guest
What are your qualifications, the basis for your higher than thou opinions. At least I have a degree in the environmental field and have been practicing for more than 25 years. I may be a “newbie” to this forum but not to the issues. You are very condescending.Your comment about the toilet is a nice try at being cute and witty, however it betrays your arrogance and your left leaning position on the matter. You cannot reason with a leftist liberal with an agenda. Enough said.For the sceptics amongst us:
Suggest that we use the only trully ubiased group for further discussion. Namely the intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. They don’t do any reasearch. Only assess the reasearch which has been done objectively.
The full reports are availible for your reading pleasure at ipcc.ch/.
When you are finished reading through those, you can come back and contribute. There might be a bit more “meat on the bone” for further discussion. Newbie, you are of course allowed to print them out and read while you sit on your water saving toilet if you prefer
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