[Cold Iron]

Sorry I have to strongly disagree with this because you are severely reducing the validity of the global warming argument. Pascal's wager is not based on any facts, climate change is. Yes it's true we don't have all the facts, but we do have a lot. It is not a wager to act on facts.

[Cold Iron]

More news: (i know it's all from the same source, I just got google desktop and i have a discovery news widget, feel free to add something else)

Record Heat for Land Surfaces in March
America's Jet Stream Creeping North
Eating Green: Food Type Trumps Distance

[Mushroom]

Yep, the world certainly is getting warmer..

To give the argument more perspective
http://www.dailytech.com/Temperature+Monit...rticle10866.htm

But...
also take into account the Sun be cooling at the moment, putting into perspective what would be more of an impact on weather change than what humans can ever do.
http://solarscience....spotCycle.shtml

[Cold Iron]

Sorry, you have old data, we just had the warmest march land temps and second warmest march land and sea temps on record. Read the article above.

Edit: Also, people take note, the second set of graphs is not temperature but sunspot cycles. Here's a graph with more than 4 years of data:



I advise you to read JoJo's post as well, mushroom.

[Morgoth]

I just don't understand why this debate cause so much polarization to begin with. To me it doesn't matter in the slightest whether global warming actually is human created, human influence, or purely a natural cyclical event. What matters is that it might very well be human made, and so surely the only logical thing to do is to act as if it is? If we're wrong, and it isn't then we've managed to clean up our living a bit, which certainly isn't a bad thing anyways. But if we're right, we might be able to preserve our way of life if we act.

[Macros]

I still think its ridiculous that anyone can argue we're NOT affecting the environment. If the weather change is cyclical our actions surely have to be exaserbating it and acelerating. Yes I know one of the largest methane discharges in the world comes from natural peat bogs and all the other polava, but consider also a huge contributor is domesticated animals, bovine population would not be anywhere near its current levels if not for intensive farming, it simply couldn't happen. And the sheer amount of fossil fuels we're burning, the cut and burn taking place in the amazon, it would have to be a cataclysm to affect the world on the scale we clearly are.

[Cold Iron]

I don't want to stereotype but I think it is likely that the following groups have large portions overlapping:

global warming deniers
peak oil deniers
george bush supporters
hummer drivers
intelligent design/creationists
rapture believers

[Terez]

Don't forget the secondhand smoke causes cancer deniers...

[paladin]

Macros;292610 said:

I still think its ridiculous that anyone can argue we're NOT affecting the environment. If the weather change is cyclical our actions surely have to be exaserbating it and acelerating. Yes I know one of the largest methane discharges in the world comes from natural peat bogs and all the other polava, but consider also a huge contributor is domesticated animals, bovine population would not be anywhere near its current levels if not for intensive farming, it simply couldn't happen. And the sheer amount of fossil fuels we're burning, the cut and burn taking place in the amazon, it would have to be a cataclysm to affect the world on the scale we clearly are.

i dont think people think we arent affecting the environment. i think that many people believe, like myself, that there are things outside of human control or influence that have greater influence than we do and that these events would happen inevitably either way based on the history of the planet.

can we do things better? sure. should modernized nations like the US and many european countries suffer economically(and thus socially) from the impact of proposed extreme greenhouse gas/pollution measures while south american and eastern countries are exempt from scrutiny when they are the worst polluters(or growing into the worst)? change is made gradually, but if we dont put effort into other areas of the world rather than hamstringing ourselves in the global economy we wont make any headway because the growing economies in india, china, vietnam, south america, etc will outpace any "savings" in modernized countries

[Terez]

Paladin, that's scarily similar to the argument that was made against the emancipation of slaves in the US...

[paladin]

except one involved oppressing people and one involves not oppressing people.

[Cold Iron]

Bullshit, refusing to allow the gap between the first, second and third worlds to narrow at any cost is exactly the same kind of oppression. Only worse because this time there is a devastating side effect.

[Cold Iron]

We need more action: New Research Reveals Increased Interest in Energy Efficiency, But Limited Action

Quote

According to the second annual Johnson Controls Energy Efficiency Indicator survey, nearly three-quarters (72 percent) of organizations are paying more attention to energy efficiency than they were just a year ago. However, the percentage of companies expecting to make energy efficiency improvements, as well as their planned investment over the next year, has remained constant.

Stay aware people, be interested and get involved. In complex systems, individuals make a difference.

[Cold Iron]

In case you need any more evidence (though as we've seen in this thread, if you don't believe by now, you're likely not going to change your mind):

Ocean Waves Pounding Harder

[paladin]

Cold Iron;292911 said:

Bullshit, refusing to allow the gap between the first, second and third worlds to narrow at any cost is exactly the same kind of oppression. Only worse because this time there is a devastating side effect.

wait, so we allow the third world countries to pollute like gangbusters while the modern countries take the punishment economically in manufacturing job-loss AND much higher pollution/greenhouse restriction? what kind of bullshit are you pushing?

[Cold Iron]

paladin;292938 said:

wait, so we allow the third world countries to pollute like gangbusters while the modern countries take the punishment economically in manufacturing job-loss AND much higher pollution/greenhouse restriction? what kind of bullshit are you pushing?

Allow? Get your head out of your ass, you don't allow a country to do anything. You do what is right and hope others do too. The only thing I'm suggesting at the moment is more government investment in renewables research and incentives, the only people this punishes are whoever the money is taken from, which is up to political discretion. It's up to us to develop the technologies because we aren't working like gangbusters to get our population out of poverty.

[drinksinbars]

Cold Iron;292946 said:

Allow? Get your head out of your ass, you don't allow a country to do anything. You do what is right and hope others do too. The only thing I'm suggesting at the moment is more government investment in renewables research and incentives, the only people this punishes are whoever the money is taken from, which is up to political discretion. It's up to us to develop the technologies because we aren't working like gangbusters to get our population out of poverty.

exactly - the west should stop trying to control third world countries reaching higher levels of industrialisation and instead invest in those countries offering solutions in renewable energy and providing them with the cleaner technology we employ at lower cost to make it more attractive to them. Instead of setting out ridiculous targets and spending billions enforcing them the money should be used in places where it can make a bigger difference today.

Trying to get the uk to reduce its emissions would be a lot harder than trying to reduce the emissions in china because the uk already employs technology that has been in development for years with the environment in mind. The reason the west doesnt offer this technology is because it knows that china and the east behind it is becoming the global power at the moment and are hoarding their secrets to try and reduce the power that china is wielding on the world stage.

[Macros]

I'm with DiBs on this one, 9 of the worlds 10 dirtiest/ most polluted cities in the world are in china/ india because of their massive surge in coal fired power. I'm not saying we need to stop changing, we definately do not, we need to keep shifting our focus to renewables, but pushing china and india alone into cutting emissions would do considerably more than we can at the minute, bringing them up to speed would be a better investment. also if china was to get "greener" which generally runs inline with more economical anyway, they could put their considerable power behind R&D for new technologies.

[paladin]

Cold Iron;292946 said:

Allow? Get your head out of your ass, you don't allow a country to do anything. You do what is right and hope others do too. The only thing I'm suggesting at the moment is more government investment in renewables research and incentives, the only people this punishes are whoever the money is taken from, which is up to political discretion. It's up to us to develop the technologies because we aren't working like gangbusters to get our population out of poverty.

china isnt doing anything about the poverty enjoyed by all the poor in the country. everyones talking global economy this, kyoto protocol that, but its okay to not criticize china "officially" because they're trying to increase the standard of living? does the end justify the means? you're suggesting trading the environment for wealth. its not up to us to do anything for anyone else. we're already doing our part in the scheme and others aren't playing by the rules. they need to be pushed into taking the initiative while its still easy for them to fix these problems. they are still building infrastructure. if you push them into conforming with the standards everyone else does its not going to be as hard as waiting until they're done with their little industrial revolution

Quote

exactly - the west should stop trying to control third world countries reaching higher levels of industrialisation and instead invest in those countries offering solutions in renewable energy and providing them with the cleaner technology we employ at lower cost to make it more attractive to them. Instead of setting out ridiculous targets and spending billions enforcing them the money should be used in places where it can make a bigger difference today.

Trying to get the uk to reduce its emissions would be a lot harder than trying to reduce the emissions in china because the uk already employs technology that has been in development for years with the environment in mind. The reason the west doesnt offer this technology is because it knows that china and the east behind it is becoming the global power at the moment and are hoarding their secrets to try and reduce the power that china is wielding on the world stage.

i dont think anyone is trying to limit chinas potential. they want china to follow the rules established for being a global economic country. noone is suggesting not allowing them to grow. as far as selling technology at lower cost, thats not how the economy works. noone will care to build it if they dont make the profit they want on it. the government needs to take an active role in requiring facilities to conform to a set of standards, like governments do in every other country

now the second half of your argument is what ive been saying the whole time. we waste billions of dollars in money and damage our economies in the process to reduce a few percent. modernized(meaning newest technology) industrial countries are already doing their part. we need to push growing countries that are not modernized industrially, like china and india, to correct their pollution problems.

as to your conspiracy theory that we arent offering them technology, sure we are. they can come buy it all they want. the only thing that isnt offered are technologies that are military in nature. clean coal powerplants arent military secrets and the technology(or hiring the builders) can be had for the price set by the market. same goes for most of these technologies

[Cold Iron]

paladin;293220 said:

you're suggesting trading the environment for wealth.

I'm sorry, but that is exactly what you are saying. Not me.