Moderated Global Warming Discussion

[Dancing David]

Who is freaking?

 

[Furcifer]

So you want others to pay the ultimate price for OUR lifestyle.How nice of you.

Quite the opposite given the premise. Canada only produces less than 4% of the current GH emissions. I'm suggesting we would open our doors to those displaced by the over consumption by Americans and the Chinese.

 

[Furcifer]

And how much nitrogen and phosphate fertilizer is available to make this land viable?

The sea represents an almost unlimited source of natural fertilizer. It's just a matter of when it becomes economically feasible.

 

[mushy]

I don't believe this global warming rubbish

It's just another way for our govermnets to tax us for our Carbon-footprint and use congestion charges. The climate might be changing but its nothing to do with us. The Earths climate has changed thousands of times over the course of its life, when humans were not around. Were Mammoths responsible for the last ice age?

Why do we as a society allow our goverment away with such obvious cons?

 

[chipmunk stew]

It's not the world's governments who are saying so.* It's the world's scientific community.


*edit: That is, saying that human activity has accelerated GW at an alarming rate.

 

[mushy]

It's not the world's governments who are saying so.* It's the world's scientific community.


*edit: That is, saying that human activity has accelerated GW at an alarming rate.

The Government funded scientific community.

 

[chipmunk stew]

The Government funded scientific community.

And the rest of the scientific community, too.

"Hey scientists, here's some tax money. Go invent a result that we can tax. Make sure that you get overwhelming consensus and that your invented result can be independently verified."

 

[Ysidro]

That's okay, global warming believes in you.

 

[Wowbagger]

The climate might be changing but its nothing to do with us.

You concede that the climate might be changing, but that we humans should take no action to address those changes?

Sounds irresponsible, regardless of what is causing them.


Microbial diseases have been around longer than humans, too. Maybe, by your argument, we should not address the impact they would have on our lives, either.

 

[MG1962]

The Government funded scientific community.

Yeah you know the guys. The also predict stuff like it is going to rain tomorrow.

And so far I am yet to hear of one scientist opposed to GW complain that a government tried to bribe them to falsify their results

 

[Stray Cat]

You concede that the climate might be changing, but that we humans should take no action to address those changes?

Sounds irresponsible, regardless of what is causing them.

I'd best clarify my position here before I respond to this.

I'm not a climate change denier.

Right, that out of the way. I doubt anyone can deny that the climate is changing nor that it has constantly changed since the formation of the planet billions of years ago.

The question was roughly: How do we handle it?
Is the answer to tax people more and if so, how does this help?

To say 'regardless of what is causing it' may well be the problem here.
Whilst accepting that human's have had a massive impact on our planet and accepting that they may be responsible for some climate change, to think that climate change will stop if we stop living our carbon wasteful lives is short sighted and plain wrong.

Instead of apparently putting all this effort into the present (politically motivated) tax raising and chasing our carbon footprints. There should also be an equal amount of resources put into figuring out ways of living with the natural climate change mechanisms that we can not control.

Having to pay 10p for a plastic carrier bag at the supermarket does not do anything to prepare for natural climate change nor does it slow anthropomorphic climate change down. All it does is give someone else my 10p

 

[kedo1981]

There are many aspects of the Global warming debate that deserve ones doubt.
But let me state a NEARLY indisputable fact.
Human beings are very irresponsible when it come to our environment and it is very likely that we will
suffer negative effects because of it, so we need to do something to improve our interaction with the overall environment.

 

[SlightlyAbovePar]

Global Alarmism is where the (grant & scam) money is. Global climate change is natural and cyclical. To what extent, if any, humans have/are playing a role is debatable.

 

[KingMerv00]

It's just another way for our govermnets to tax us for our Carbon-footprint and use congestion charges. The climate might be changing but its nothing to do with us. The Earths climate has changed thousands of times over the course of its life, when humans were not around. Were Mammoths responsible for the last ice age?

Why do we as a society allow our goverment away with such obvious cons?

Now you've done it. "Skeptics" don't tolerate questioning left-wing dogma.

Global Alarmism is where the (grant & scam) money is. Global climate change is natural and cyclical. To what extent, if any, humans have/are playing a role is debatable.

Could the three of you please give a very brief summary of the supposed climate-change evidence and why you find it unconvincing?

 

[Wowbagger]

The question was roughly: How do we handle it?
Is the answer to tax people more and if so, how does this help?

It seems reasonable that some tax money, somehow, somewhere, would be necessary to figure this out. Governments across the world will be spending at least something tackling these issues. The question becomes: How to most effectively use the money.

It's not unheard of for tax money to be wasted on cons, of course. But, the opening post seemed to imply that any tax money used for climate change research is some sort of scheme to grab money from the people. It did not relay any specific information about any specific acts of fraud.

Do you (or Mushy, or anyone else) have any specific evidence of a con going on, in this field?

To say 'regardless of what is causing it' may well be the problem here.

I know investigating the cause is important. I was addressing the opening post's argument. And, the exact cause was not relevant to the particular point I wanted to make, in that specific post.

Instead of apparently putting all this effort into the present (politically motivated) tax raising and chasing our carbon footprints. There should also be an equal amount of resources put into figuring out ways of living with the natural climate change mechanisms that we can not control.

I sort of agree with this. I think a comprehensive approach to climate change issues is warranted: Some money for reducing carbon footprints, and some for figuring out ways to live with what we can not change.

I suspect many governments are already doing this, or are considering doing this, anyway.

 

[Stray Cat]

Sorry I wasn't going to contribute here again as the new ruling states only one Global warming thread is allowed. But I'll make this as short as possible.

The question becomes: How to most effectively use the money.

Perhaps if they figured this bit out before they started raising everyone's taxes?

Do you (or Mushy, or anyone else) have any specific evidence of a con going on, in this field?

The plastic bag charge I mentioned is a con in my opinion.

I sort of agree with this. I think a comprehensive approach to climate change issues is warranted: Some money for reducing carbon footprints, and some for figuring out ways to live with what we can not change.

But the political 'spin' always applied to the issue is about us being the cause and this is used as a justification for raising taxes. This is dishonest and doesn't address the issue comprehensively.

There are many more practical and acceptable (by deniers as well as by accepters) reasons to improve our environment and reduce pollution and waste that don't require climate change as an excuse to implement them.
But they also don't give politicians the excuse they want for raising taxes.
Banning climate change conferences would cut down carbon footprints dramatically and cost us nothing.

 

[Furcifer]

Great, but what will they farm in Manitoba and who will pay for it? It would be less costly to reduce the amount of CO-2 emitted. Your solution is more expensive. It also only addresses one of the impacts of the AGW. There are plenty more.

No, it's a well established fact that a cheap source of energy is key to economic development not cheap food.

I am putting your name on the list.

I could fit a family of 7 in my 1 bedroom apartment in the manner to which they are accustomed. There's so much room in this country, above sea level too

Mass migration is part of human existance, and usually it occurs at much slower scales.

Ah! Yes, that's true, but like I said before, everything we do now happens at a much faster rate. I mean the last mass migration to NA was on ships with a few hundred people and it took 3 weeks. These days we can "next-day-air" them.

Not just Bangladesh, but much of Africa needs to given the opportunity to move out of places that are already barely inhabitable.

 

[DC]

Global Alarmism is where the (grant & scam) money is. Global climate change is natural and cyclical. To what extent, if any, humans have/are playing a role is debatable.

provide evidence for your claims............................

 

[Furcifer]

gheat stress will effect most crops gown in most of teh agricultural areas of teh world and you think that a marginal increase in wheat production is going to compensate for that?

This is incorrect. Corn is grown all the way from Mexico to Canada, it's not going to be affected by heat. Wheat will, but it will be replaced with corn. There will be more land for growing wheat based on the increased growing season in Canada, it just requires soil improvement.

Really, so more land will be available for wheat production about 5%, but in nontropical areas the heat stress will increase and the potential for dry spells will devistate crops. The main increase in growing would be of winter wheat.

I think you're forgetting that crops will change, and different varieties will be planted. Winter wheat in many places is planted not for the crop, but to keep the soil from drifting. I think it holds moisture or helps fertilize as well.

Now that is true (feed crops), however the fact that most of the temperate zone farming would suffer heat stress and catastrophic damage from dry spells is a real issue. Especially in teh Midwest of teh US, rain fall decreases or stays the same in most models. So no more maize, which is a great crop in terms of production. More heat tolerant crops that are less productive. And teh rain fall here in Illinois, one inch less a month would kill the crops with higher temps.

This is just alarmist programming telling you this and not logic. Crops are grown in vastly different climates, more different than Global Warming presents. It's just requires change. Slow change, over 50 years or so.

Geez man, they grow stuff in Arizona now because they have irrigation. They will most certainly be able to do so, even without GMO's in the midwest in the future. It's not the climate that's the problem, it's resistance to change.

So lets see, putting glass over a ten thousand acre farm costs relatively about the same as retrofitting clean capture technology on a single coal plant. Now production stations have multiple plants. But again it is more cost effective to implement a capture technology than to compensate for it.

Wait, that's the price of land, did you mean the cost of greenhouses? Greenhouses are about $1M for every 5 acres, but that's state of the art and real Dutch glass. Yields are different due to the number of picks. If you want a fair cost I'd have to crunch some more numbers.

Capture technology right now triples to quadruples the cost to build and raises the cost of electricity by about x2.8 if memory serves. It won't be long before that's mandated. (I'd have to find the DOE docs again to verify this before you quote me on it)

Agreed and definitely more xenophobic as a melting pot. Me son is a Newfie.

This is just something they need to get over. Have to get over.

 

[Wowbagger]

Perhaps if they figured this bit out before they started raising everyone's taxes?

I appreciate the sentiment. But, alas, this is not a problem unique to climate change.

To some degree, governments do try to figure these things out, before they start raising taxes. But, the system is certainly not perfect.

If you have some good ideas about how to improve the efficiency of government spending, please let us know.

The plastic bag charge I mentioned is a con in my opinion.

Can you elaborate on that? Do you think it is a deliberate con, forged from the malicious intent of some corrupt officials?

Or, is merely an innocent, well-meaning, but ultimately ineffective, inefficiency in spending? (which might not actually constitute a "con", unless someone was knowingly lying somewhere, in a significant manner.)

Or, something in between?

Why?



Suppose we do find concrete evidence that one or more climate change policies were high-grade scams. Would that imply that all of climate change was one giant hoax? The science, the other policies, etc.?


When it turned out that NYC's CityTime system was con, how many people said this?:
"Oh, that means ANY and ALL timesheet systems are a con! City employees shouldn't use any systems to track their time on the job!!! It's a waste of tax payer's money!!" That seems to be similar to the attitude of the opening post.

But the political 'spin' always applied to the issue is about us being the cause and this is used as a justification for raising taxes. This is dishonest and doesn't address the issue comprehensively.

A. Isn't this an issue, then, with how policy is communicated? Can you address how government policy, in actuality, has not been as comprehensive as you wish?

B. Do you have evidence that we are not "the cause"? I think it is justifiable, if it can be reliably shown that we are at least a significant one. (I doubt we would be the sole cause, of course. Climate is too chaotic a system for anything to be the only cause of anything else, most of the time.)