As was foretold, we've added advertisements to the forums! If you have questions, or if you encounter any bugs, please visit this thread: https://forums.penny-arcade.com/discussion/240191/forum-advertisement-faq-and-reports-thread/

The Coming Climate Catastrophe- Can Countries Control it Collectively?

245

Posts

  • OremLKOremLK Registered User regular
    edited April 2009
    Dunadan019 wrote: »
    Azio wrote: »
    Why should we believe you are qualified to make these pronouncements in direct contradiction to 97 percent of climatologists

    The fact that you don't know that there is a difference between predicting next week's weather (meteorology) and studying weather patterns in terms of averages over long periods of time (climatology) doesn't inspire a lot of confidence.

    I am also seeing no evidence that carbon taxes would cause remotely the same amount of suffering as the water shortages, famine, and mass ecological disaster that will have to occur before "the market" decides to do anything about it.

    you can see into the future?

    /da

    Seriously, though, I'm pretty sure that nowhere near the above mentioned 97% of climatologists believe that such a doomsday scenario is likely. There's quite a bit of a leap from "Global warming is occurring, and human activities have something to do with it", to "water shortages, famine, and mass ecological disaster".

    OremLK on
    My zombie survival life simulator They Don't Sleep is out now on Steam if you want to check it out.
  • ObsObs __BANNED USERS regular
    edited April 2009
    Wasn't there some study a while back that found that Glaciers had actually not melted as much as scientists thought and some of them actually froze back or something?

    Obs on
  • Professor PhobosProfessor Phobos Registered User regular
    edited April 2009
    Obs wrote: »
    Wasn't there some study a while back that found that Glaciers had actually not melted as much as scientists thought and some of them actually froze back or something?

    You might be thinking of a study last year on Greenland that found it was melting at a slower rate than it was before. The reason for this is that all the "easy to melt ice" went ahead and melted, now they're down to the tougher stuff. In the early 2000s, the melting rates were all projected based on current melting. But now glaciologists know how to nuance their projections to take into account different 'kinds' of ice.
    Seriously, though, I'm pretty sure that nowhere near the above mentioned 97% of climatologists believe that such a doomsday scenario is likely. There's quite a bit of a leap from "Global warming is occurring, and human activities have something to do with it", to "water shortages, famine, and mass ecological disaster".

    Uh, no. Water scarcity, sea level rise, and destruction of agricultural areas is all in the "likely" box, depending on how much heating your talking about. The real doomsday scenarios- the nightmare stuff like the clathrate gun hypothesis- don't seem too likely at this point. But we're still gonna get hit by huge costs due to our changing of the climate.
    There isn't a problem though. At least not yet. There are certainly symptoms of climate change but they aren't necessarily problematic, at least not as far as human existence is concerned. If they become problematic sometime in the future then maybe they will be addressed by technological advances or the market.

    This is deeply unethical and insane. "At least not as far as human existence is concerned" ? You mean like human existence in Bangladesh? Tell me, o' Kevin Nash, how is the market going to handle millions of people displaced by sea level rise and drought having to migrate? Often across national borders?

    "Addressed by technological advances..." the market doesn't just miraculously shit out a technological advance when you need it. There's no guarantee whatsoever we'll develop the ability to reverse what we've done.

    And remember, CO2 has a long tail. It stays in the atmosphere for a damn long time. Any emissions we put out, we're stuck with. That's the problem with CO2- it can accumulate, it can change the radiative balance of the atmosphere for the long term. So any delay in action just makes the problem worse when we finally decide we have to do something.
    Absolutely nothing until we have definitive proof that it will cause catastrophe.

    Proof is for math. Theories are for science. You've displayed no indication you understand the distinction, or really, understand science at all.
    We can't even fucking predict the weather next week. We have no idea what the results of global warming will be in 100 years. People who claim they know are lying and not using science to come to their conclusions, but rather hysteria.

    You don't know the difference between climate and weather and yet you claim enough authority to dispel the scientific consensus of every geoscience institution on the entire planet as hysteria?
    Drastically destroying the world economy even further because some hippies think we're gonna murder all the penguins and then graduate to steroid el nino is fucking asinine.

    No what's fucking asinine is some libertarian saying that this will destroy the world economy- when every sane analysis says it'll save us all money. What's asinine is taking a "wait and see approach" when we've been doing that for twenty years. We've waited and we've seen.

    "Some hippies" is the entire geoscience community, with like, ten exceptions for some dudes who think it's cosmic rays.

    Jesus Christ, this is a no-brainer. Save the Earth, save the Market. How well do you think the Dow is going to trade on the day the levees break in New York?

    Professor Phobos on
  • override367override367 ALL minions Registered User regular
    edited April 2009
    KevinNash wrote: »
    Glorfindel wrote: »
    KevinNash wrote: »

    TL,DR: What should we do about global warming?


    Absolutely nothing until we have definitive proof that it will cause catastrophe.

    Is it happening? Yes. Are humans causing it? In conjunction with natural other occurrence most likely yes. Will it result in tidal waves demolishing New York City? Highly unlikely and absolutely no viable studies can point to that. At all.

    We can't even fucking predict the weather next week. We have no idea what the results of global warming will be in 100 years. People who claim they know are lying and not using science to come to their conclusions, but rather hysteria.

    So instead of taxes or carbon credits or cap trade or other destructive behavior we should simply take a wait and see approach. The byproduct of not polluting may impact this in a healthy way regardless. Drastically destroying the world economy even further because some hippies think we're gonna murder all the penguins and then graduate to steroid el nino is fucking asinine.

    Think of it as an insurance policy - a carbon tax is a regular insurance policy paid out by society to cover the event that climate does actually result in some really bad shit going down.

    Usually you make insurance decisions based on data of past occurrences and can justify the cost. This isn't equivalent to that since we're basing this very hefty price tag on something that has a microscopic chance of happening.
    Note, I believe that climate change is a genuine problem that needs to be addressed. Business cannot, or will not, address on their own either, so government is needed to step in and correct a market failure to address an externality.

    There isn't a problem though. At least not yet. There are certainly symptoms of climate change but they aren't necessarily problematic, at least not as far as human existence is concerned. If they become problematic sometime in the future then maybe they will be addressed by technological advances or the market.

    Government loves to fix problems that don't actually exist. This is yet another example of that.


    What about this, coal power kills tens of thousands of people in the US each year from measurable pollution. We are going to hit a production wall as soon as the economy recovers with oil, leading to its inevitable peak.

    Neither of these solutions are handled well by the market. In case 1 the companies doing the polluting don't care, and in case 2 the market won't react fast enough to prevent the next great global recession.

    Global warming is yet another good reason to do this, I'm aware we realistically have decades before it goes from "problem" to "catastrophe", and the situation may be salvagable even then, but look at the cost to fix it today vs the cost to fix it then.

    I mean, personally I think automobiles are less of a problem for global warming than coal plants simply because we aren't going to be able to keep using them more than another 2 decades to near the extent we do now. Call me a nutjob but regardless of what we do I'm betting on $8+ gallon gas in the US within 5 years. Best to alter people's habits today, and look we get to save the planet while doing it. Fancy that.

    override367 on
  • Dunadan019Dunadan019 Registered User regular
    edited April 2009
    Seriously, though, I'm pretty sure that nowhere near the above mentioned 97% of climatologists believe that such a doomsday scenario is likely. There's quite a bit of a leap from "Global warming is occurring, and human activities have something to do with it", to "water shortages, famine, and mass ecological disaster".

    Uh, no. Water scarcity, sea level rise, and destruction of agricultural areas is all in the "likely" box, depending on how much heating your talking about. The real doomsday scenarios- the nightmare stuff like the clathrate gun hypothesis- don't seem too likely at this point. But we're still gonna get hit by huge costs due to our changing of the climate.
    There isn't a problem though. At least not yet. There are certainly symptoms of climate change but they aren't necessarily problematic, at least not as far as human existence is concerned. If they become problematic sometime in the future then maybe they will be addressed by technological advances or the market.

    This is deeply unethical and insane. "At least not as far as human existence is concerned" ? You mean like human existence in Bangladesh? Tell me, o' Kevin Nash, how is the market going to handle millions of people displaced by sea level rise and drought having to migrate? Often across national borders?

    "Addressed by technological advances..." the market doesn't just miraculously shit out a technological advance when you need it. There's no guarantee whatsoever we'll develop the ability to reverse what we've done.

    And remember, CO2 has a long tail. It stays in the atmosphere for a damn long time. Any emissions we put out, we're stuck with. That's the problem with CO2- it can accumulate, it can change the radiative balance of the atmosphere for the long term. So any delay in action just makes the problem worse when we finally decide we have to do something.

    we exhale CO2. all of those effects are likely to be seen simply by our increasing population and anything you do to halt emissions will eventually happen anyway. forcing people to buy hybrid cars will hardly even slow it down. if someone doesn't come up with a way to change CO2 into O2.... well we better have a really big war or release a virus that makes 90% of the population sterile.

    also, stop acting like water will all of a sudden rise 10 feet and millions of people will have to migrate all at once to other places... it won't work like that.

    Dunadan019 on
  • Venkman90Venkman90 Registered User regular
    edited April 2009
    Jesus Christ, this is a no-brainer. Save the Earth, save the Market. How well do you think the Dow is going to trade on the day the levees break in New York?

    This is a mirror on my thinking, the markets may not like a shift to renewables and drop in consumption, but thats thinking very short term when they really won't like a shift to having to fight for food in the Thunderdome.

    Venkman90 on
  • Professor PhobosProfessor Phobos Registered User regular
    edited April 2009
    Dunadan019 wrote: »
    Seriously, though, I'm pretty sure that nowhere near the above mentioned 97% of climatologists believe that such a doomsday scenario is likely. There's quite a bit of a leap from "Global warming is occurring, and human activities have something to do with it", to "water shortages, famine, and mass ecological disaster".

    Uh, no. Water scarcity, sea level rise, and destruction of agricultural areas is all in the "likely" box, depending on how much heating your talking about. The real doomsday scenarios- the nightmare stuff like the clathrate gun hypothesis- don't seem too likely at this point. But we're still gonna get hit by huge costs due to our changing of the climate.
    There isn't a problem though. At least not yet. There are certainly symptoms of climate change but they aren't necessarily problematic, at least not as far as human existence is concerned. If they become problematic sometime in the future then maybe they will be addressed by technological advances or the market.

    This is deeply unethical and insane. "At least not as far as human existence is concerned" ? You mean like human existence in Bangladesh? Tell me, o' Kevin Nash, how is the market going to handle millions of people displaced by sea level rise and drought having to migrate? Often across national borders?

    "Addressed by technological advances..." the market doesn't just miraculously shit out a technological advance when you need it. There's no guarantee whatsoever we'll develop the ability to reverse what we've done.

    And remember, CO2 has a long tail. It stays in the atmosphere for a damn long time. Any emissions we put out, we're stuck with. That's the problem with CO2- it can accumulate, it can change the radiative balance of the atmosphere for the long term. So any delay in action just makes the problem worse when we finally decide we have to do something.

    we exhale CO2. all of those effects are likely to be seen simply by our increasing population and anything you do to halt emissions will eventually happen anyway. forcing people to buy hybrid cars will hardly even slow it down. if someone doesn't come up with a way to change CO2 into O2.... well we better have a really big war or release a virus that makes 90% of the population sterile.

    Okay, "human population is causing CO2 rise" is pants-on-head insane. It does not compute. Yes, we exhale CO2. Yes, there are more of us now. But we are a tiny, tiny part of that fraction. This a total distraction from the real discussion, which is the huge amount of CO2 put out by human industry releasing previously trapped CO2 from fossil fuels.
    also, stop acting like water will all of a sudden rise 10 feet and millions of people will have to migrate all at once to other places... it won't work like that.

    A slow and steady rise still displaces coastal dwellers.

    Professor Phobos on
  • tsmvengytsmvengy Registered User regular
    edited April 2009
    Dunadan019 wrote: »
    Seriously, though, I'm pretty sure that nowhere near the above mentioned 97% of climatologists believe that such a doomsday scenario is likely. There's quite a bit of a leap from "Global warming is occurring, and human activities have something to do with it", to "water shortages, famine, and mass ecological disaster".

    Uh, no. Water scarcity, sea level rise, and destruction of agricultural areas is all in the "likely" box, depending on how much heating your talking about. The real doomsday scenarios- the nightmare stuff like the clathrate gun hypothesis- don't seem too likely at this point. But we're still gonna get hit by huge costs due to our changing of the climate.
    There isn't a problem though. At least not yet. There are certainly symptoms of climate change but they aren't necessarily problematic, at least not as far as human existence is concerned. If they become problematic sometime in the future then maybe they will be addressed by technological advances or the market.

    This is deeply unethical and insane. "At least not as far as human existence is concerned" ? You mean like human existence in Bangladesh? Tell me, o' Kevin Nash, how is the market going to handle millions of people displaced by sea level rise and drought having to migrate? Often across national borders?

    "Addressed by technological advances..." the market doesn't just miraculously shit out a technological advance when you need it. There's no guarantee whatsoever we'll develop the ability to reverse what we've done.

    And remember, CO2 has a long tail. It stays in the atmosphere for a damn long time. Any emissions we put out, we're stuck with. That's the problem with CO2- it can accumulate, it can change the radiative balance of the atmosphere for the long term. So any delay in action just makes the problem worse when we finally decide we have to do something.

    we exhale CO2. all of those effects are likely to be seen simply by our increasing population and anything you do to halt emissions will eventually happen anyway. forcing people to buy hybrid cars will hardly even slow it down. if someone doesn't come up with a way to change CO2 into O2.... well we better have a really big war or release a virus that makes 90% of the population sterile.

    also, stop acting like water will all of a sudden rise 10 feet and millions of people will have to migrate all at once to other places... it won't work like that.

    The exhalation argument is bullshit because breathing is CARBON NEUTRAL. All that CO2 you breathe out came from a source that absorbed it - plant matter that you either ate or was eaten by something you ate.

    The entire point is that we are pumping tons of carbon that was sequestered (in fossil fuels) out into the atmosphere.

    tsmvengy on
    steam_sig.png
  • Dunadan019Dunadan019 Registered User regular
    edited April 2009
    Dunadan019 wrote: »
    Seriously, though, I'm pretty sure that nowhere near the above mentioned 97% of climatologists believe that such a doomsday scenario is likely. There's quite a bit of a leap from "Global warming is occurring, and human activities have something to do with it", to "water shortages, famine, and mass ecological disaster".

    Uh, no. Water scarcity, sea level rise, and destruction of agricultural areas is all in the "likely" box, depending on how much heating your talking about. The real doomsday scenarios- the nightmare stuff like the clathrate gun hypothesis- don't seem too likely at this point. But we're still gonna get hit by huge costs due to our changing of the climate.
    There isn't a problem though. At least not yet. There are certainly symptoms of climate change but they aren't necessarily problematic, at least not as far as human existence is concerned. If they become problematic sometime in the future then maybe they will be addressed by technological advances or the market.

    This is deeply unethical and insane. "At least not as far as human existence is concerned" ? You mean like human existence in Bangladesh? Tell me, o' Kevin Nash, how is the market going to handle millions of people displaced by sea level rise and drought having to migrate? Often across national borders?

    "Addressed by technological advances..." the market doesn't just miraculously shit out a technological advance when you need it. There's no guarantee whatsoever we'll develop the ability to reverse what we've done.

    And remember, CO2 has a long tail. It stays in the atmosphere for a damn long time. Any emissions we put out, we're stuck with. That's the problem with CO2- it can accumulate, it can change the radiative balance of the atmosphere for the long term. So any delay in action just makes the problem worse when we finally decide we have to do something.

    we exhale CO2. all of those effects are likely to be seen simply by our increasing population and anything you do to halt emissions will eventually happen anyway. forcing people to buy hybrid cars will hardly even slow it down. if someone doesn't come up with a way to change CO2 into O2.... well we better have a really big war or release a virus that makes 90% of the population sterile.

    Okay, "human population is causing CO2 rise" is pants-on-head insane. It does not compute. Yes, we exhale CO2. Yes, there are more of us now. But we are a tiny, tiny part of that fraction. This a total distraction from the real discussion, which is the huge amount of CO2 put out by human industry releasing previously trapped CO2 from fossil fuels.
    also, stop acting like water will all of a sudden rise 10 feet and millions of people will have to migrate all at once to other places... it won't work like that.

    A slow and steady rise still displaces coastal dwellers.

    the current human population exhales about 5 billion kg of Co2 per day or 1.8 trillion kg (1.8x10^12) a year. there is about 3x10^15 kg of Co2 in the atmosphere. the epa says that automobiles produce 1.37x10^12 kg per year

    doesn't look like nothing to me.

    Dunadan019 on
  • Professor PhobosProfessor Phobos Registered User regular
    edited April 2009
    tsmvengy wrote: »
    Dunadan019 wrote: »
    Seriously, though, I'm pretty sure that nowhere near the above mentioned 97% of climatologists believe that such a doomsday scenario is likely. There's quite a bit of a leap from "Global warming is occurring, and human activities have something to do with it", to "water shortages, famine, and mass ecological disaster".

    Uh, no. Water scarcity, sea level rise, and destruction of agricultural areas is all in the "likely" box, depending on how much heating your talking about. The real doomsday scenarios- the nightmare stuff like the clathrate gun hypothesis- don't seem too likely at this point. But we're still gonna get hit by huge costs due to our changing of the climate.
    There isn't a problem though. At least not yet. There are certainly symptoms of climate change but they aren't necessarily problematic, at least not as far as human existence is concerned. If they become problematic sometime in the future then maybe they will be addressed by technological advances or the market.

    This is deeply unethical and insane. "At least not as far as human existence is concerned" ? You mean like human existence in Bangladesh? Tell me, o' Kevin Nash, how is the market going to handle millions of people displaced by sea level rise and drought having to migrate? Often across national borders?

    "Addressed by technological advances..." the market doesn't just miraculously shit out a technological advance when you need it. There's no guarantee whatsoever we'll develop the ability to reverse what we've done.

    And remember, CO2 has a long tail. It stays in the atmosphere for a damn long time. Any emissions we put out, we're stuck with. That's the problem with CO2- it can accumulate, it can change the radiative balance of the atmosphere for the long term. So any delay in action just makes the problem worse when we finally decide we have to do something.

    we exhale CO2. all of those effects are likely to be seen simply by our increasing population and anything you do to halt emissions will eventually happen anyway. forcing people to buy hybrid cars will hardly even slow it down. if someone doesn't come up with a way to change CO2 into O2.... well we better have a really big war or release a virus that makes 90% of the population sterile.

    also, stop acting like water will all of a sudden rise 10 feet and millions of people will have to migrate all at once to other places... it won't work like that.

    The exhalation argument is bullshit because breathing is CARBON NEUTRAL. All that CO2 you breathe out came from a source that absorbed it - plant matter that you either ate or was eaten by something you ate.

    The entire point is that we are pumping tons of carbon that was sequestered (in fossil fuels) out into the atmosphere.

    Yes. Thank you. I was so busy keeping my brain from exploding I couldn't articulate this point.

    The other problem is that we're steadily destroying natural sinks for carbon as well- deforestation, etc. So nature is absorbing less and we're adding more. In fact, we'd have cleared 500 PPM by now if nature wasn't taking up a lot of the slack. About 50% of what we emit is absorbed.

    Professor Phobos on
  • SaammielSaammiel Registered User regular
    edited April 2009
    How do you propose to control the emissions of agents outside the United States? No one can ever give an adequate answer to this.

    I mean great, the US taxes the shit out of carbon. As a result the poor probably get fucked. This is pretty much unavoidable. They bear higher costs for energy, a lot of which isn't completely able to be mitigated, and a lot of semi-skilled jobs are currently tied up in CO2 generating industries (coal mining, refinery work, construction, etc). You won't be able to cover the subsidies necessary to prevent this purely from carbon taxes and any generalized tax increase will likely doom your scenario from the get go. Demand shifts, CO2 levels fall.

    Meanwhile places outside the United States will continue generating increasing CO2 levels since doing so is a fairly easy means to gain prosperity, considering the alternatives. The primacy of making people not poverty stricken will easily overwhelm any hand wringing about potential future catastrophe.

    Saammiel on
  • Dunadan019Dunadan019 Registered User regular
    edited April 2009
    tsmvengy wrote: »
    Dunadan019 wrote: »
    Seriously, though, I'm pretty sure that nowhere near the above mentioned 97% of climatologists believe that such a doomsday scenario is likely. There's quite a bit of a leap from "Global warming is occurring, and human activities have something to do with it", to "water shortages, famine, and mass ecological disaster".

    Uh, no. Water scarcity, sea level rise, and destruction of agricultural areas is all in the "likely" box, depending on how much heating your talking about. The real doomsday scenarios- the nightmare stuff like the clathrate gun hypothesis- don't seem too likely at this point. But we're still gonna get hit by huge costs due to our changing of the climate.
    There isn't a problem though. At least not yet. There are certainly symptoms of climate change but they aren't necessarily problematic, at least not as far as human existence is concerned. If they become problematic sometime in the future then maybe they will be addressed by technological advances or the market.

    This is deeply unethical and insane. "At least not as far as human existence is concerned" ? You mean like human existence in Bangladesh? Tell me, o' Kevin Nash, how is the market going to handle millions of people displaced by sea level rise and drought having to migrate? Often across national borders?

    "Addressed by technological advances..." the market doesn't just miraculously shit out a technological advance when you need it. There's no guarantee whatsoever we'll develop the ability to reverse what we've done.

    And remember, CO2 has a long tail. It stays in the atmosphere for a damn long time. Any emissions we put out, we're stuck with. That's the problem with CO2- it can accumulate, it can change the radiative balance of the atmosphere for the long term. So any delay in action just makes the problem worse when we finally decide we have to do something.

    we exhale CO2. all of those effects are likely to be seen simply by our increasing population and anything you do to halt emissions will eventually happen anyway. forcing people to buy hybrid cars will hardly even slow it down. if someone doesn't come up with a way to change CO2 into O2.... well we better have a really big war or release a virus that makes 90% of the population sterile.

    also, stop acting like water will all of a sudden rise 10 feet and millions of people will have to migrate all at once to other places... it won't work like that.

    The exhalation argument is bullshit because breathing is CARBON NEUTRAL. All that CO2 you breathe out came from a source that absorbed it - plant matter that you either ate or was eaten by something you ate.

    The entire point is that we are pumping tons of carbon that was sequestered (in fossil fuels) out into the atmosphere.

    i didn't realize that there are 6 times more plants than there were in the 1800s... i thought it was actually the opposite....

    or did you not why i brought up breathing?

    Dunadan019 on
  • ProtoProto Registered User regular
    edited April 2009
    Dunadan019 wrote: »
    tsmvengy wrote: »
    Dunadan019 wrote: »
    Seriously, though, I'm pretty sure that nowhere near the above mentioned 97% of climatologists believe that such a doomsday scenario is likely. There's quite a bit of a leap from "Global warming is occurring, and human activities have something to do with it", to "water shortages, famine, and mass ecological disaster".

    Uh, no. Water scarcity, sea level rise, and destruction of agricultural areas is all in the "likely" box, depending on how much heating your talking about. The real doomsday scenarios- the nightmare stuff like the clathrate gun hypothesis- don't seem too likely at this point. But we're still gonna get hit by huge costs due to our changing of the climate.
    There isn't a problem though. At least not yet. There are certainly symptoms of climate change but they aren't necessarily problematic, at least not as far as human existence is concerned. If they become problematic sometime in the future then maybe they will be addressed by technological advances or the market.

    This is deeply unethical and insane. "At least not as far as human existence is concerned" ? You mean like human existence in Bangladesh? Tell me, o' Kevin Nash, how is the market going to handle millions of people displaced by sea level rise and drought having to migrate? Often across national borders?

    "Addressed by technological advances..." the market doesn't just miraculously shit out a technological advance when you need it. There's no guarantee whatsoever we'll develop the ability to reverse what we've done.

    And remember, CO2 has a long tail. It stays in the atmosphere for a damn long time. Any emissions we put out, we're stuck with. That's the problem with CO2- it can accumulate, it can change the radiative balance of the atmosphere for the long term. So any delay in action just makes the problem worse when we finally decide we have to do something.

    we exhale CO2. all of those effects are likely to be seen simply by our increasing population and anything you do to halt emissions will eventually happen anyway. forcing people to buy hybrid cars will hardly even slow it down. if someone doesn't come up with a way to change CO2 into O2.... well we better have a really big war or release a virus that makes 90% of the population sterile.

    also, stop acting like water will all of a sudden rise 10 feet and millions of people will have to migrate all at once to other places... it won't work like that.

    The exhalation argument is bullshit because breathing is CARBON NEUTRAL. All that CO2 you breathe out came from a source that absorbed it - plant matter that you either ate or was eaten by something you ate.

    The entire point is that we are pumping tons of carbon that was sequestered (in fossil fuels) out into the atmosphere.

    i didn't realize that there are 6 times more plants than there were in the 1800s... i thought it was actually the opposite....

    or did you not why i brought up breathing?

    we grow our food.


    (I am dying of laughter over here.)

    Proto on
    and her knees up on the glove compartment
    took out her barrettes and her hair spilled out like rootbeer
  • Dunadan019Dunadan019 Registered User regular
    edited April 2009
    Proto wrote: »
    Dunadan019 wrote: »
    tsmvengy wrote: »
    Dunadan019 wrote: »
    Seriously, though, I'm pretty sure that nowhere near the above mentioned 97% of climatologists believe that such a doomsday scenario is likely. There's quite a bit of a leap from "Global warming is occurring, and human activities have something to do with it", to "water shortages, famine, and mass ecological disaster".

    Uh, no. Water scarcity, sea level rise, and destruction of agricultural areas is all in the "likely" box, depending on how much heating your talking about. The real doomsday scenarios- the nightmare stuff like the clathrate gun hypothesis- don't seem too likely at this point. But we're still gonna get hit by huge costs due to our changing of the climate.
    There isn't a problem though. At least not yet. There are certainly symptoms of climate change but they aren't necessarily problematic, at least not as far as human existence is concerned. If they become problematic sometime in the future then maybe they will be addressed by technological advances or the market.

    This is deeply unethical and insane. "At least not as far as human existence is concerned" ? You mean like human existence in Bangladesh? Tell me, o' Kevin Nash, how is the market going to handle millions of people displaced by sea level rise and drought having to migrate? Often across national borders?

    "Addressed by technological advances..." the market doesn't just miraculously shit out a technological advance when you need it. There's no guarantee whatsoever we'll develop the ability to reverse what we've done.

    And remember, CO2 has a long tail. It stays in the atmosphere for a damn long time. Any emissions we put out, we're stuck with. That's the problem with CO2- it can accumulate, it can change the radiative balance of the atmosphere for the long term. So any delay in action just makes the problem worse when we finally decide we have to do something.

    we exhale CO2. all of those effects are likely to be seen simply by our increasing population and anything you do to halt emissions will eventually happen anyway. forcing people to buy hybrid cars will hardly even slow it down. if someone doesn't come up with a way to change CO2 into O2.... well we better have a really big war or release a virus that makes 90% of the population sterile.

    also, stop acting like water will all of a sudden rise 10 feet and millions of people will have to migrate all at once to other places... it won't work like that.

    The exhalation argument is bullshit because breathing is CARBON NEUTRAL. All that CO2 you breathe out came from a source that absorbed it - plant matter that you either ate or was eaten by something you ate.

    The entire point is that we are pumping tons of carbon that was sequestered (in fossil fuels) out into the atmosphere.

    i didn't realize that there are 6 times more plants than there were in the 1800s... i thought it was actually the opposite....

    or did you not why i brought up breathing?

    we grow our food.

    so arable land is actually increasing and not decreasing?

    cool.

    Dunadan019 on
  • tsmvengytsmvengy Registered User regular
    edited April 2009
    Dunadan019 wrote: »
    tsmvengy wrote: »
    Dunadan019 wrote: »
    Seriously, though, I'm pretty sure that nowhere near the above mentioned 97% of climatologists believe that such a doomsday scenario is likely. There's quite a bit of a leap from "Global warming is occurring, and human activities have something to do with it", to "water shortages, famine, and mass ecological disaster".

    Uh, no. Water scarcity, sea level rise, and destruction of agricultural areas is all in the "likely" box, depending on how much heating your talking about. The real doomsday scenarios- the nightmare stuff like the clathrate gun hypothesis- don't seem too likely at this point. But we're still gonna get hit by huge costs due to our changing of the climate.
    There isn't a problem though. At least not yet. There are certainly symptoms of climate change but they aren't necessarily problematic, at least not as far as human existence is concerned. If they become problematic sometime in the future then maybe they will be addressed by technological advances or the market.

    This is deeply unethical and insane. "At least not as far as human existence is concerned" ? You mean like human existence in Bangladesh? Tell me, o' Kevin Nash, how is the market going to handle millions of people displaced by sea level rise and drought having to migrate? Often across national borders?

    "Addressed by technological advances..." the market doesn't just miraculously shit out a technological advance when you need it. There's no guarantee whatsoever we'll develop the ability to reverse what we've done.

    And remember, CO2 has a long tail. It stays in the atmosphere for a damn long time. Any emissions we put out, we're stuck with. That's the problem with CO2- it can accumulate, it can change the radiative balance of the atmosphere for the long term. So any delay in action just makes the problem worse when we finally decide we have to do something.

    we exhale CO2. all of those effects are likely to be seen simply by our increasing population and anything you do to halt emissions will eventually happen anyway. forcing people to buy hybrid cars will hardly even slow it down. if someone doesn't come up with a way to change CO2 into O2.... well we better have a really big war or release a virus that makes 90% of the population sterile.

    also, stop acting like water will all of a sudden rise 10 feet and millions of people will have to migrate all at once to other places... it won't work like that.

    The exhalation argument is bullshit because breathing is CARBON NEUTRAL. All that CO2 you breathe out came from a source that absorbed it - plant matter that you either ate or was eaten by something you ate.

    The entire point is that we are pumping tons of carbon that was sequestered (in fossil fuels) out into the atmosphere.

    i didn't realize that there are 6 times more plants than there were in the 1800s... i thought it was actually the opposite....

    or did you not why i brought up breathing?

    Take a fucking biology class. The carbon people exhale doesn't come out of nowhere, and you aren't eating coal and drinking oil.

    Let me break it down for you:

    1. We grow food (corn, wheat, arugula, avocados, lettuce, whatever) - during the growing process those plants take in CO2 (because that's what plants do) and store it in the form of glucose and other molecules.
    2. We eat the plants and absorb the carbon storing nutrients inside.
    3. Our bodies process the carbon storing nutrients, releasing the energy and separating the carbon
    4. Our bodies dispose of the carbon by exhalation
    GOTO 1

    Alternatively:
    2a. Livestock eat the plants
    2b. We eat the livestock

    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:CellRespiration.svg

    If you can't accept this then you need to answer the following question:
    Where is the "extra" carbon in your equation coming from?

    tsmvengy on
    steam_sig.png
  • EndomaticEndomatic Registered User regular
    edited April 2009
    Saammiel wrote: »
    How do you propose to control the emissions of agents outside the United States? No one can ever give an adequate answer to this.

    I mean great, the US taxes the shit out of carbon. As a result the poor probably get fucked. This is pretty much unavoidable. They bear higher costs for energy, a lot of which isn't completely able to be mitigated, and a lot of semi-skilled jobs are currently tied up in CO2 generating industries (coal mining, refinery work, construction, etc). You won't be able to cover the subsidies necessary to prevent this purely from carbon taxes and any generalized tax increase will likely doom your scenario from the get go. Demand shifts, CO2 levels fall.

    Meanwhile places outside the United States will continue generating increasing CO2 levels since doing so is a fairly easy means to gain prosperity, considering the alternatives. The primacy of making people not poverty stricken will easily overwhelm any hand wringing about potential future catastrophe.

    Yes, I think about this aspect a lot.

    How will this be dealt with? Imagine the perfect scenario where the U.S and Canada become carbon-neutral.

    Will the neutrality of North America be able to make up for the rest of the worlds' CO2 production?

    We put out how much of the CO2 on a global scale? I really have no idea so will not offer any numbers.

    Endomatic on
  • Professor PhobosProfessor Phobos Registered User regular
    edited April 2009
    Saammiel wrote: »
    How do you propose to control the emissions of agents outside the United States? No one can ever give an adequate answer to this.

    Well, Europe and Japan are already on board, with Latin America also cool with it to a degree. We can finance clean-energy industrialization for Africa and Latin America. Then the problem is (mostly) just India and China. It's a matter for diplomacy.

    More importantly, any reduction in emissions is good for the globe. You're basically articulating a perfect solutions fallacy- the absence of a perfect, worldwide solution does not mean any individual state can't contribute. We have to start somewhere, and the US can pretty easily afford to start a major shift towards sustainable and emissions neutral sources.
    I mean great, the US taxes the shit out of carbon. As a result the poor probably get fucked. This is pretty much unavoidable.

    No, there are a variety of ways to avoid that, some already discussed on this thread. Also, it's important to note that the fucking of poor people from an emissions tax is nothing compared to the fucking of poor people that would emerge from serious global warming. Net poor people fucking is waaaaay on the side of what would happen if we did nothing, and much harder to mitigate with public policy tools. It'd take more than a tax credit to make up for sea level rise or droughts.
    Will the neutrality of the U.S be able to make up for the rest of the worlds' CO2 production?

    No, but it would definitely help. And we can always support efforts elsewhere in the world to reduce emissions.

    Professor Phobos on
  • EndomaticEndomatic Registered User regular
    edited April 2009
    Well, that's more like it!

    Endomatic on
  • OremLKOremLK Registered User regular
    edited April 2009
    You really can't just hand-wave away India and China, though. China alone supports a larger population than the U.S., Canada, Japan, and Europe combined. Both countries are undergoing an explosion of industrial growth that will be very difficult to temper at the kind of levels you're discussing.

    OremLK on
    My zombie survival life simulator They Don't Sleep is out now on Steam if you want to check it out.
  • Professor PhobosProfessor Phobos Registered User regular
    edited April 2009
    OremLK wrote: »
    You really can't just hand-wave away India and China, though. China alone supports a larger population than the U.S., Canada, Japan, and Europe combined. Both countries are undergoing an explosion of industrial growth that will be very difficult to temper at the kind of levels you're discussing.

    Absolutely. Note, however, that the net carbon impact of the United States is still ahead of China- they're going to have to pump out what they're doing for a couple more years before their total impact is ahead of the US.

    But again, it's not like it wouldn't help to have the western world go carbon efficient. It would make diplomacy easier w/ regard to the industrializing countries, and in so doing we'd have developed ways to "skip ahead" of dirty industrialization. We have a lot of these already, all we'd have to do is demonstrate their viability.

    Given how climate sensitive much of China is and how badly they could fuck themselves with global warming, it's in their long-term interest to try for carbon emission reduction. But it's in their short term economic interest to catch up to the rest of the world as quickly as possible. Bridging that gap is going to be extremely difficult, but we have to try.

    Professor Phobos on
  • OremLKOremLK Registered User regular
    edited April 2009
    What does the growth of their carbon emissions look like compared to ours, out of curiosity?

    OremLK on
    My zombie survival life simulator They Don't Sleep is out now on Steam if you want to check it out.
  • EndomaticEndomatic Registered User regular
    edited April 2009
    How likely is China to get right on board with a U.S-led initiative?

    I'm not sure how relations are these days, but I'm prone to think they are pretty strained. Maybe I'm wrong.

    Endomatic on
  • DmanDman Registered User regular
    edited April 2009
    There are already proposed solutions to the "what about countries that do nothing about global warming(china, india or whoever)".

    You tax the shit out of carbon in your own country, and then anything coming into the country is taxed (tariff) based on how much carbon was emitted making it. Countries that are taxing carbon production like your own country don't have to pay the tariff and free trade with those countries continues as normal.

    Edit: basically if canada/USA/mexico/European union all tax their own carbon emissions but china doesn't anything coming from china to north america or europe get's carbon taxed at the point of entry.

    Dman on
  • Professor PhobosProfessor Phobos Registered User regular
    edited April 2009
    Endomatic wrote: »
    How likely is China to get right on board with a U.S-led initiative?

    I'm not sure how relations are these days, but I'm prone to think they are pretty strained. Maybe I'm wrong.

    Not likely. China sees it as a covert attempt to stall their economic progress, and (accurately) points out that the industrialized countries have the luxury of going green in modern times because they had an extremely dirty period of growth.

    Relations are decent in some areas, strained in others.
    What does the growth of their carbon emissions look like compared to ours, out of curiosity?

    I think they started outpacing us in yearly emissions in...2005, maybe? If I knew how to put images into posts, I'd go find a chart.

    Professor Phobos on
  • DmanDman Registered User regular
    edited April 2009
    OremLK wrote: »
    What does the growth of their carbon emissions look like compared to ours, out of curiosity?

    from:http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kyoto_Protocol

    below is a table of the changes in greenhouse gas2 emissions of some countries.[89]
    Country Change in greenhouse gas
    Emissions (1992-2007)
    India +103%
    China +150%
    United States +20%
    Russian Federation -20%
    Japan +11%
    Worldwide Total +38%

    Edit: see also http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_carbon_dioxide_emissions

    Dman on
  • werehippywerehippy Registered User regular
    edited April 2009
    And a lot of the innovations in cleaner production and technology won't need to be legislated to take hold in other countries, they just need to be created and be shown to be better alternatives. The more developed economies line up the incentives to put a lot of pressure on companies and consumers to find cleaner alternatives to current products and industry methods (which can easily be done while mitigating the impact on lower income citizens), which creates a large demand and speeds up technological development and general innovation. That technology then naturally bleeds over to other economies regardless of whether or not there is a legislative mandate in place because they're likely to be cheaper and less resource intensive.

    Put another way, Honda has cleaner cars produced more cheaply and efficiently and if the Big Three hadn't had theirs heads up their asses they could have easily copied those innovations years ago and been much better off for it.

    werehippy on
  • Professor PhobosProfessor Phobos Registered User regular
    edited April 2009
    Yeah, that's a good point. Luckily a lot of the stuff we could do to reduce emissions come in the form of increased energy efficiency, which often has net savings. Just today I saw something on the Empire State Building spending $20 million to make a change that will save them $4.4 million a year. That's definitely worth it.

    Professor Phobos on
  • JudgementJudgement Registered User regular
    edited April 2009
    I hate to admit it, but I've always seemed to lean toward the center-right side of politics. I've never, however, shut out opposing arguements or remained stubborn based on the point of view the conservative side takes.

    I agree that we need to make some changes in the American life-style(big cars, carbon-emissions, dependency on foriegn oil, etc.) But I don't know if this will slow or stop the progression of Global Warming, because (a)if the damage has been done, how do we fix it? & (b) the Earth decides when it is going to change(climate wise), so if it takes a turn for a more heated Earth, are we not fucked already?

    Yes, humans have played a part in the warming of the planet. Yes, the old arguements about liberals being socialists/fascists because they want more environmentally-friendly products are stagnant. However, you can't deny that some may have taken these ideas and combined them with either profitable means, trend-setter pride, or both. I hate arguements where someone says "Global warming is a myth because there is no scientific evidence" because they're fucking retarded, or (and I've been told this) "You're just being stubborn. Obviously, your not a good guy 'cause you don't care about the planet." because I (1) never said I don't care, (2) how is it stubborn that I have an opposing view, and (3) you took what I said and twisted it into something deformed to try and make me look bad. Please, go die. You'll do humanity AND the planet some good.

    But I'm WAY off point. Anyways, America always seems to be a fairly liberal country(stubborn at times) so we'll be seeing some changes in our Auto industry soon enough. Also, get China on the ball. Perhaps not a complete makeover is nessecary, but it would be wise if they didn't follow in the industrial country's footsteps completely. As for taxing carbon emissions, cars should be taxed, but judging from the current economic situation, not for a while. Breathing, yes, cause if you could really find a way to do it, you should get the "Can Sell Anything" award.

    Earth isn't going to incinerate into a glowing timber anytime soon, but making sure that we've got some clean are in 50-60 years would be nice.

    Judgement on
    309151-1.png
  • SaammielSaammiel Registered User regular
    edited April 2009
    Saammiel wrote: »
    How do you propose to control the emissions of agents outside the United States? No one can ever give an adequate answer to this.

    Well, Europe and Japan are already on board, with Latin America also cool with it to a degree. We can finance clean-energy industrialization for Africa and Latin America. Then the problem is (mostly) just India and China. It's a matter for diplomacy.

    Latin America is only cool with it because they don't have to do anything currently. And you honestly think we are going to be able to fund and maintain a clean industry industrialization for half the world? Man, why don't we just solve global warming via pixie dust, it would be about as realistic a scenario.
    More importantly, any reduction in emissions is good for the globe. You're basically articulating a perfect solutions fallacy- the absence of a perfect, worldwide solution does not mean any individual state can't contribute. We have to start somewhere, and the US can pretty easily afford to start a major shift towards sustainable and emissions neutral sources.

    Actually I am espousing a cost-benefits argument. If the cost of some prohibitive tax is great, and there are small or unknown benefits, then we should not bear that cost. Hence I favor gradual changes that reduce the societal cost.
    I mean great, the US taxes the shit out of carbon. As a result the poor probably get fucked. This is pretty much unavoidable.

    No, there are a variety of ways to avoid that, some already discussed on this thread. Also, it's important to note that the fucking of poor people from an emissions tax is nothing compared to the fucking of poor people that would emerge from serious global warming. Net poor people fucking is waaaaay on the side of what would happen if we did nothing, and much harder to mitigate with public policy tools. It'd take more than a tax credit to make up for sea level rise or droughts.

    I am extremely skeptical of the claims that the tax revenue incurred from taxing carbon can remedy the harm caused to the poor. I don't actually oppose taxing externalities such as CO2 production. It is perfectly reasonable. But such a tax should be graduated to minimize societal shocks and should not be punative. Which sort of runs contrary to 'tax the shit out of it'. And we should at least make an attempt to quantify what the actual cost (as best as we can) of the externality is.

    And you honestly think that America is going to engage in a global trade war over a carbon tax? We are not. Such an idea would be a political and economic catastrophe.

    Saammiel on
  • durandal4532durandal4532 Registered User regular
    edited April 2009
    What gradual changes are we talking about? Make them gradual enough and they'll hit around the same time we run out of oil.

    durandal4532 on
    Take a moment to donate what you can to Critical Resistance and Black Lives Matter.
  • Phoenix-DPhoenix-D Registered User regular
    edited April 2009
    If we measured the actual cost of the externality carbon would have taxes so high you'd freak out. So that won't work. We're talking in the long run about the total destruction of entire nations here. Relocating that number of people isn't cheap. And that's only the most visible effect.

    Phoenix-D on
  • werehippywerehippy Registered User regular
    edited April 2009
    Saammiel wrote: »
    I mean great, the US taxes the shit out of carbon. As a result the poor probably get fucked. This is pretty much unavoidable.

    No, there are a variety of ways to avoid that, some already discussed on this thread. Also, it's important to note that the fucking of poor people from an emissions tax is nothing compared to the fucking of poor people that would emerge from serious global warming. Net poor people fucking is waaaaay on the side of what would happen if we did nothing, and much harder to mitigate with public policy tools. It'd take more than a tax credit to make up for sea level rise or droughts.

    I am extremely skeptical of the claims that the tax revenue incurred from taxing carbon can remedy the harm caused to the poor. I don't actually oppose taxing externalities such as CO2 production. It is perfectly reasonable. But such a tax should be graduated to minimize societal shocks and should not be punative. Which sort of runs contrary to 'tax the shit out of it'. And we should at least make an attempt to quantify what the actual cost (as best as we can) of the externality is.

    And you honestly think that America is going to engage in a global trade war over a carbon tax? We are not. Such an idea would be a political and economic catastrophe.

    It's pretty much a consensus that it's more than possible to mitigate the impact of the lower income while still having tons of money left over for infrastructure and reinvestment, but someone else will need to see if they can find the specifics on the math.

    My understanding is that it's possible because the average carbon usage is much higher than the median carbon usage. Basically the higher your income the exponentially higher your energy usage (heating energy requirements increase by I believe the square of the increase square footage of home size, flying regularly is significantly worse than commuting to work, etc). That means if you take half the money that carbon taxes raise and just split it up evenly among everyone, most people get as much or more back as the tax will cost them, the people above average usage will bear an increased cost, and there's still tons of cash free to use.

    werehippy on
  • KevinNashKevinNash Registered User regular
    edited April 2009
    Proof is for math. Theories are for science. You've displayed no indication you understand the distinction, or really, understand science at all.
    ....

    You don't know the difference between climate and weather and yet you claim enough authority to dispel the scientific consensus of every geoscience institution on the entire planet as hysteria?

    The consensus is that it is happening and humans are having an impact. There is absolutely no "scientific consensus" that global warming will result in catastrophe. None. At all. In fact it's a minority opinion.

    So yes it's hysteria. It's being exacerbated by people like you who claim the world will asplode because of cars and light bulbs. Global warming alarmists belong in airports handing out flyers, not shaping public policy.

    You're welcome to believe that gaia is angry and ready to strike us down with lightning bolts and a rising water table. You're welcome to go live in a cave and swear off technology. What you're not welcome to do is tell me how much it should cost to drive a car, or use the internets.

    China doesn't like that shit either.

    KevinNash on
  • SaammielSaammiel Registered User regular
    edited April 2009
    werehippy wrote: »
    It's pretty much a consensus that it's more than possible to mitigate the impact of the lower income while still having tons of money left over for infrastructure and reinvestment, but someone else will need to see if they can find the specifics on the math.

    My understanding is that it's possible because the average carbon usage is much higher than the median carbon usage. Basically the higher your income the exponentially higher your energy usage (heating energy requirements increase by I believe the square of the increase square footage of home size, flying regularly is significantly worse than commuting to work, etc). That means if you take half the money that carbon taxes raise and just split it up evenly among everyone, most people get as much or more back as the tax will cost them, the people above average usage will bear an increased cost, and there's still tons of cash free to use.

    I'd like to see the math if it can be dug up. Since it seems that a lot of that consumption would also be mitigated by the use of newer goods than the poor. A new house is likely to have better insulation than an aging apartment. A new car likely has more stringent emissions control than a beater. Organic food likely has a smaller carbon footprint than McDonalds. I'm amenable to the idea that this is not the case, or that it is overwhelmed by those other factors, but I'd like to see the math. And also if it takes into account the job destruction that will be caused by the shift to higher tech green jobs. Consumption is just one side of the coin.

    Saammiel on
  • Professor PhobosProfessor Phobos Registered User regular
    edited April 2009
    KevinNash wrote: »
    Proof is for math. Theories are for science. You've displayed no indication you understand the distinction, or really, understand science at all.
    ....

    You don't know the difference between climate and weather and yet you claim enough authority to dispel the scientific consensus of every geoscience institution on the entire planet as hysteria?

    The consensus is that it is happening and humans are having an impact. There is absolutely no "scientific consensus" that global warming will result in catastrophe. None. At all. In fact it's a minority opinion.

    What do you mean by catastrophe, Kevin? You seem to be responding to a straw man. I did not suggest that we need to live in caves, for example.

    Professor Phobos on
  • werehippywerehippy Registered User regular
    edited April 2009
    @ Saammiel
    A quick and dirty google finds the article I was thinking of here by Ezra Klein at American Prospect. The article is a bit light and its focused on cap and trade auctions vs free permits (basically generating revenue versus only limiting emissions) but it links to the CBO analysis and the math for any tax is the same.

    This also doesn't deal with jobs, but I find it hard to believe there's going to be a net job lost in at least the short or mid term. Immediately, there should be minimal job losses because the tax is just an extra cost that for the most part will be passed on to the consumer. As new technologies are developed they'll create new jobs ahead of the job destruction in dirty industries. In the longer term there will possibly be some job lose as consumption is cut back, but that's more than likely a necessary occurrence (6 billion can't consume at the same level Americans currently do).

    werehippy on
  • [Tycho?][Tycho?] As elusive as doubt Registered User regular
    edited April 2009
    KevinNash wrote: »
    Proof is for math. Theories are for science. You've displayed no indication you understand the distinction, or really, understand science at all.
    ....

    You don't know the difference between climate and weather and yet you claim enough authority to dispel the scientific consensus of every geoscience institution on the entire planet as hysteria?

    The consensus is that it is happening and humans are having an impact. There is absolutely no "scientific consensus" that global warming will result in catastrophe. None. At all. In fact it's a minority opinion.

    So yes it's hysteria. It's being exacerbated by people like you who claim the world will asplode because of cars and light bulbs. Global warming alarmists belong in airports handing out flyers, not shaping public policy.

    You're welcome to believe that gaia is angry and ready to strike us down with lightning bolts and a rising water table. You're welcome to go live in a cave and swear off technology. What you're not welcome to do is tell me how much it should cost to drive a car, or use the internets.

    China doesn't like that shit either.

    Is the climate of the earth changing?
    Yes.

    Are humans having a significant impact on this change?
    Yes.

    Will this result in catastrophe?
    We don't know.

    Wait, what?
    Weather is inherently chaotic, and poorly understood to boot. We can't really say what will happen.

    So something awesomely good could come from it?
    Yes, maybe.

    So something horrendously bad could come from it?
    Yes, maybe.

    When will we know if it will be good or bad?
    We don't know.

    Ok... so if we lessen our impact, how long will it take to get back to "normal"?
    We don't know.

    But the more change occurs the longer it will take to get back to normal, right?
    Probably a lot longer, but we don't really know.

    So this change is basically a gamble then? Unknown results, which we won't be able to change back? Which could be good, bad, or neutral?
    Pretty much.

    So if this is a gamble, whats the safest bet?
    ...

    [Tycho?] on
    mvaYcgc.jpg
  • Professor PhobosProfessor Phobos Registered User regular
    edited April 2009
    [Tycho?] wrote: »
    KevinNash wrote: »
    Proof is for math. Theories are for science. You've displayed no indication you understand the distinction, or really, understand science at all.
    ....

    You don't know the difference between climate and weather and yet you claim enough authority to dispel the scientific consensus of every geoscience institution on the entire planet as hysteria?

    The consensus is that it is happening and humans are having an impact. There is absolutely no "scientific consensus" that global warming will result in catastrophe. None. At all. In fact it's a minority opinion.

    So yes it's hysteria. It's being exacerbated by people like you who claim the world will asplode because of cars and light bulbs. Global warming alarmists belong in airports handing out flyers, not shaping public policy.

    You're welcome to believe that gaia is angry and ready to strike us down with lightning bolts and a rising water table. You're welcome to go live in a cave and swear off technology. What you're not welcome to do is tell me how much it should cost to drive a car, or use the internets.

    China doesn't like that shit either.

    Is the climate of the earth changing?
    Yes.

    Are humans having a significant impact on this change?
    Yes.

    Will this result in catastrophe?
    We don't know.

    Wait, what?
    Weather is inherently chaotic, and poorly understood to boot. We can't really say what will happen.

    So something awesomely good could come from it?
    Yes, maybe.

    So something horrendously bad could come from it?
    Yes, maybe.

    When will we know if it will be good or bad?
    We don't know.

    Ok... so if we lessen our impact, how long will it take to get back to "normal"?
    We don't know.

    But the more change occurs the longer it will take to get back to normal, right?
    Probably a lot longer, but we don't really know.

    So this change is basically a gamble then? Unknown results, which we won't be able to change back? Which could be good, bad, or neutral?
    Pretty much.

    So if this is a gamble, whats the safest bet?
    ...

    In addition to the "insurance" argument, in which the uncertainty of the situation still results in a logical selection of mitigation because the possible negative consequences are pretty horrific, I'd like to make a couple of comments...

    "Something awesomely good" is much less likely than "Something horrendously bad." While the consensus is that it will be bad but not civilization-ending bad, the uncertainty is such that we can't rule out the possibilty of consequences far worse than we project, whereas we can more easily rule out consequences far better than our current projections.

    Professor Phobos on
  • CycloneRangerCycloneRanger Registered User regular
    edited April 2009
    [Tycho?] wrote: »
    KevinNash wrote: »
    Proof is for math. Theories are for science. You've displayed no indication you understand the distinction, or really, understand science at all.
    ....

    You don't know the difference between climate and weather and yet you claim enough authority to dispel the scientific consensus of every geoscience institution on the entire planet as hysteria?

    The consensus is that it is happening and humans are having an impact. There is absolutely no "scientific consensus" that global warming will result in catastrophe. None. At all. In fact it's a minority opinion.

    So yes it's hysteria. It's being exacerbated by people like you who claim the world will asplode because of cars and light bulbs. Global warming alarmists belong in airports handing out flyers, not shaping public policy.

    You're welcome to believe that gaia is angry and ready to strike us down with lightning bolts and a rising water table. You're welcome to go live in a cave and swear off technology. What you're not welcome to do is tell me how much it should cost to drive a car, or use the internets.

    China doesn't like that shit either.

    Is the climate of the earth changing?
    Yes.

    Are humans having a significant impact on this change?
    Yes.

    Will this result in catastrophe?
    We don't know.

    Wait, what?
    Weather is inherently chaotic, and poorly understood to boot. We can't really say what will happen.

    So something awesomely good could come from it?
    Yes, maybe.
    And here you go wrong. The odds of a net "good" coming from global warming are extremely small. As it is, humanity has molded itself—its cultures, societies, and population distributions—to fit the current climate. Even if the climate changed to something that an outside observer would call "better" if given the choice between it and the pre-warming Earth, that change would still be disastrous for us because we're already here having adapted to the world as it is now. And the same is true to an even greater extent of every other species.

    And further, it's really unlikely that something we'd call "better" is going to come of this. Countless (non-human) species are going to become extinct, and the weather will become increasingly unstable. As I understand it, the normal mechanisms that maintain Earth's environment cannot cope with the rate of warming that is currently projected. Even if the end result were not so bad (although personally I like having things like coral reefs on my planet), the interim period while things stabilize will be pretty awful.

    CycloneRanger on
  • AzioAzio Registered User regular
    edited April 2009
    Judgement wrote: »
    I hate to admit it, but I've always seemed to lean toward the center-right side of politics. I've never, however, shut out opposing arguements or remained stubborn based on the point of view the conservative side takes.

    I agree that we need to make some changes in the American life-style(big cars, carbon-emissions, dependency on foriegn oil, etc.) But I don't know if this will slow or stop the progression of Global Warming, because (a)if the damage has been done, how do we fix it? & (b) the Earth decides when it is going to change(climate wise), so if it takes a turn for a more heated Earth, are we not fucked already?
    I don't understand why so-called "moderates" and "center-rightists" continually take this position. Whether or not the warming trend is irreversible, and whether or not catastrophe occurs, we will still be better off intervening in the economy to end our reliance on fossil fuels because we'll get to enjoy cleaner air, better relations with other countries, not having our guys blown up in the Middle East, and the wealth that will inevitably result from selling that tech to China and India (assuming they don't see the writing on the wall and beat us to the punch). How can this possibly be seen as a bad thing.

    Azio on
Sign In or Register to comment.