Global Warmers Promote Dark Ages, Permanently

[bit_pattern]

"WE" must of course exclude Al Gore, and Barack Obama, and the tens of thousands of lovelies flying and driving to all the environmental conferences, and.....

THEY preach. YOU, way over there in the corner, PRACTICE.

Yeah! First-person, plural personal pronoun's are inherently Socialist! I'm tired of having this elitist grammar shoved down my throat by evil, stupid educators!

 

[rwguinn]

Cattle methane is simply a recycling of carbon already present in the active carbon cycle and totally irrelevent to any consideration of issues of the additions of carbon to the biosphere from previously sequestered carbon reserves. The latter yields composition changes of our atmosphere that decreases the rate at which our planet re-radiates the energy it absorbs from sunlight. The former, just like the carbon in our exhalations are a part of the active carbon cycle which is constantly flowing from the air to be built up into sugars and carbohydrates in plants, which then get consumed by animals, which we break down for energy by combining with oxygen, generating CO2 that we exhale back into the active cycle. Though the path through this cycle is complex the system is balanced and somewhat buffered. Our Anthropogenic forcing is primarily due to the fact that we are tapping reserves from outside of this balanced system and adding it into the system at a level and rate that is overwhelming the buffering system and sequestration rates.

Rather simplistically stated.

So, burning down whole forests does not contribute to GW, since the forests are "carbon already present in the active carbon cycle and totally irrelevent to any consideration of issues of the additions of carbon to the biosphere from previously sequestered carbon reserves.".

Interesting philosophy...

 

[bit_pattern]

"The global warming scam .... is the greatest and most successful pseudoscientific fraud I have seen in my long life as a physicist." - Hal Lewis

"Lewis, should know, having plunged the money hose into his mouth, ears, nose and places where no one wants to go, especially when he was chair at Santa Barbara. Lewis is another patricide claiming mercy as an orphan. Indeed, this sort of accusation is very prominent from the senior denialists, mostly because that is what they have done and they expect that everyone on the other side is doing just what they did. Afterall, they did it and they are the smartest nuts on the tree." - Eli Rabbet

http://rabett.blogspot.com/2010/10/church-rips-hal-lewis-thesis-down.html

 

[Trakar]

I disagree, although I found your post to be very thought provoking and I do see where you are coming from, but it would seem to me that you are thinking in the very long term, whereas in the very short term the sudden explosion of industrial-scale farming and the pronounced radiative forcing of methane as compared to carbon has to be having a significant impact on the current problem we face. AT the very least, it is an unwelcome addition to the sudden rise in previously sequestered carbon that has very suddenly entered the atmosphere, cumulatively that has to be a big problem, even if it does balance itself out eventually in the grand accounting book. At this point, anything we can do to reduce GHG's has to be an imperative.

big difference between biogenic methane from farm animals, and the sequestered methane from calthrates and the vast thawing northern bog lands. Bovine emissions are pretty much the same as those of what were once vast herds of bison, antelope, and every other ruminant ungulate wild or domestic. I oppose factory meat farms for three primary reasons, I generally prefer diversity over monoculture, I dislike the carbon costs of transporting the meat from where it is raised to where it is consumed, we end up with a product that is generally inferior - if inexpensive. Of these, only one is even related to climate and that has more to do with carbon fuels than cow burps/emissions (for a reason). We have to careful to distinguish between the actual sources of our problem, sequestered carbon being flooded back into our environment and normal environmental carbon. Carbon is not evil, we are carbon-based life forms and require an abundance of it to survive.

 

[Trakar]

So, burning down whole forests does not contribute to GW, since the forests are "carbon already present in the active carbon cycle and totally irrelevent to any consideration of issues of the additions of carbon to the biosphere from previously sequestered carbon reserves.".

Interesting philosophy...

While there are some short term area/regional bumps in the case of forest fires these are generally more due to the smoke and ash than the overall CO2 emitted. Global Warming contributes much more to forest fires than forest fires contribute to Global Warming. The loss of diversity diminishes us all and narrows our future options, but it is a minor player as little or none of the carbon in most forests have been there for more than a couple of centuries (there are always exceptions), and even massive uncontrolled forest fires don't burn long enough or consume enough volume to generate truely significant volumes of CO2.

Forest fires only become significant when we are talking about concentrating 10's of millions of years worth of planetary forests down into carbon rich chunks and burning it all at a continuous and accelerating rate in the span a couple of centuries.

 

[keale]

Edited by Cuddles: 

Edited quote of moderated post.

"The global warming scam .... is the greatest and most successful pseudoscientific fraud I have seen in my long life as a physicist." - Hal Lewis

http://www.thegwpf.org/ipcc-news/1670-hal-lewis-my-resignation-from-the-american-physical-society.html

Id like to address specifically the quote from Hal Lewis

He seems to be suggesting that there is a conspiracy not just in the US but worldwide regarding the science and the data collected and used for global warming/climate change research. Now thats one hell of an allegation id like to see what evidence there is to support this idea. Its not like we have the only scientists in the world looking at this particular problem. Why havent the Chinese or hell any other country gone public and said that AGW is a crock? What would be the motivation?

 

[Trakar]

Id like to address specifically the quote from Hal Lewis

He seems to be suggesting that there is a conspiracy not just in the US but worldwide regarding the science and the data collected and used for global warming/climate change research. Now thats one hell of an allegation id like to see what evidence there is to support this idea. Its not like we have the only scientists in the world looking at this particular problem. Why havent the Chinese or hell any other country gone public and said that AGW is a crock? What would be the motivation?

(It's all a socialist/communist plot, and everyone knows all them eggheads is really socialists anyway, professors, researchers, every single one of them!)

(even those coming out against it are socialists, they just aren't very good at it and easy to bribe)

 

[Mikemcc]

Have to include a lot of those component suppliers and high tech companies in the conspiracy too. How dare they try to make components and systems less power hungry? Don't they know they've got to contribute towards making the economy grow by funding the power sector...

 

[leftysergeant]

The mention of Hal Lewis as though he were an authority on the subject made me go Google him.

Given that he is about 87 years old, is anyone going to get offended if I suggest that he is starting to lose his marbles?

 

[OhMan]

Didn't read the thread, just read the OP. I am angry at OP.


OK, so let us imagine the worst possible case imaginable, that we have to completely abandon electricity and technology and completely go back to the "dark ages". Dark ages being a misleading term because we could still have a civil society without technology, we wouldn't revert to their previous culture as well. We would just be losing our technology.

So, that is the worse possible scenario - and it is STILL preferable to the alternative. The reduction by 80% is so we don't all freaking DIE. We have to stop this **** so the planet doesn't overheat and we all roast. If going back to the 'dark ages' is what it is gonna take, than that's what we have to do!

I would rather lose electricity and technology, then lose the entire planet! THINK boy!

 

[varwoche]

Who's "They"?

INRM, I'm also interested to learn who they is.

We even had a thread about they in the CT section...
CTs Concerning Global Warming Science

... and there's one thing I learned: There are a handful of members who point fingers at they, but none who are willing/able to coherently explain who in the bloody hell they are. Rather, the accusations tend to come in the form of drive-bys, ala INRM.

(Though clearly Al Gore, the favorite piñata of GW pseudo-skeptics, is part of they.)

 

[JoeTheJuggler]

WHO is willing to return to the dark ages, permanently. Show of hands please?

So what fuel did they burn during the dark ages that didn't emit carbon?

Your entire argument is deeply flawed.

 

[JoeTheJuggler]

OK, so let us imagine the worst possible case imaginable, that we have to completely abandon electricity and technology and completely go back to the "dark ages".

And since electricity itself is not a carbon-emitting energy, it doesn't at all logically follow that cutting back carbon emissions 80% by 2050 would require giving up electricity and technology based on electricity.

ETA:

Dark ages being a misleading term because we could still have a civil society without technology,

Just a minor quibble: they did indeed have technology in the "dark ages". They had technology in the Old Stone Age (in fact, the kind of technology they had is what gave that age its name). The term "technology" is not equal to "modern electronics".

 

[JoeTheJuggler]

The thread BEGAN quite rationally.

Not if you define "rationally" as some sort of reasonable and logical line of argument.

Do you realize that we can generate electricity several ways without emitting significant amounts of carbon into the atmosphere?*

So why do you think an 80% reduction in carbon emissions by 2050 would be so devastating?

*ETA: I could make a list if you like.

 

[JoeTheJuggler]

1. I asked SPECIFICS. HOW will you fly to Mumbai without creating tons of carbon dioxide? Answer that please.

2. HOW will you visit your auntie in a far away state? Exactly?
Public transportation uses lots of fossil fuels. When you get there, you still need cars.

Public transportation doesn't have to use fuels that result in massive carbon emissions. And there are a great many cities where you can visit relatives without using an individual car when you get there. And believe it or not, we already have electric cars that emit no carbon at all. (And again, we already have several technologies to generate electricity with virtually no carbon emissions.)

I don't know about flying.

But remember, the stated goal is an 80% reduction in emissions overall by 2050. There may be some areas that lag behind while other areas go to virtually zero carbon emissions. (That's sort of the idea behind cap and trade schemes.)

 

[JoeTheJuggler]

There is no reason for any disruption at all. New power plants are built, as they come on-line, older plants are decommissioned. New cars, trains, ships, busses, trucks and planes are built, older ones are scrapped. It happens all the time, past, present and future. Instead on mining and processing coal and oil, we are creating alternative fuels and power plants. We gain energy independence, side-step looming "peak" resource issues, and deal with climate change while stimulating technological advancement and development as well as creating a wealth of new economic opportunites.

Very good point.

There was a point in St. Louis' history, during the Victorian Age, when so much very dirty coal was being burned in factories and to heat individual homes that the sun was completely obscured during the day time by the soot and smoke. There was no revolutionary or disruptive change that happened. Coal-burning furnaces and plants gradually got replaced, and even those that remained were updated and improved. Now, we are emitting a lot less carbon for the amount of energy we are using, and the city air isn't nearly as bad as it was back then.

 

[haufniensis]

Jonathan,

I hope you will respond to this note. I am a persuadable moderate, and I respect your passion though I wish you were more temperate in some of your remarks. (More flies with honey, if you know what I mean.) "Here I can stand I, can do no other," that's great, but we need to engage each other.

For starters, I have read all your notes and I promise to follow your links and check out the main source you have cited. I will get back to you about that.

For now, I would simply hope that you might specify an end point, a datum which would falsify your current views. I am willing to specify an end point which would falsify my currently tentative view. Will you do the same?

Let's say that between 2016-2020 the arctic ice extent falls below 20% of the documented extent of 1979. On the other hand, let's say the arctic ice extent stays above 60% of that level in that time period. The former finding would be consistent with AGW, the latter would be consistent with its debunking.

The main thing about science is that its findings need to be subject to falsifaction with new data. Will you help me out here?

 

[mhaze]

Jonathan,

I hope you will respond to this note. I am a persuadable moderate, and I respect your passion though I wish you were more temperate in some of your remarks. (More flies with honey, if you know what I mean.) "Here I can stand I, can do no other," that's great, but we need to engage each other.

For starters, I have read all your notes and I promise to follow your links and check out the main source you have cited. I will get back to you about that.

For now, I would simply hope that you might specify an end point, a datum which would falsify your current views. I am willing to specify an end point which would falsify my currently tentative view. Will you do the same?

Let's say that between 2016-2020 the arctic ice extent falls below 20% of the documented extent of 1979. On the other hand, let's say the arctic ice extent stays above 60% of that level in that time period. The former finding would be consistent with AGW, the latter would be consistent with its debunking.

The main thing about science is that its findings need to be subject to falsifaction with new data. Will you help me out here?

Your question is poorly formed, since a clear idea is required of historical arctic ice and of it's variability. That is needed over significant time scales, then by using similar significant time scales, you can make a statement such as you wish to make and make inferences thereof.

However 1979 to present does not present such a time scale, and neither does a momentary movement of ice above or below 20 or 60 percent from that moment.

Generally speaking, "climate" is 30 years. That means that given the historical database a priori you could establish statistical variability then look for a 30 year period which had significant variation and for the causes. But you are trying to use a 30 year period for the base and a momentary or instantaneous deviation for a significant event.

Won't work.

 

[mhaze]

Very good point.

There was a point in St. Louis' history, during the Victorian Age, when so much very dirty coal was being burned in factories and to heat individual homes that the sun was completely obscured during the day time by the soot and smoke. ....

Oh, like China and Thailand today?

Hmm....

 

[JoeTheJuggler]

Oh, like China and Thailand today?

Hmm....

I don't know what conditions are like there, but I suspect they're not like they were at the height of coal burning in Victorian St. Louis.

At any rate, per capita carbon emissions in China and Thailand is much lower than that of the U.S. (Also, a great deal of carbon emissions in China is attributable to U.S. consumption.) Even so, I suspect they're not doing what we did in the Victorian Age here. And that that change took place without being disruptive.

At any rate, I'd personally be in favor of international attempts at limiting carbon emissions. The Kyoto Protocol, for example.

ETA: And back to my point: the OP seems to think that reducing carbon emissions means going backward technologically. I was pointing out that here things have improved since the Victorian Age.