Originally Posted By woody >>Yup, no sense in doing anything drastic right now -- oil is right up at $100 a barrel and all the Big Oil companies are making money hand over fist. We wouldn't want to rush into any sort of energy policy that might change that on the account of a little global warming, would we?<< Public policy should never be based on questionable science. Global Warming predicts an apocalyptic result. We should stop buying oil based on price alone. We shouldn't attack oil companies for making a profit. How about attacking gluttony for causing global warming?
Originally Posted By jonvn "I don't care who it is, I'm not going to stand for people resorting to that type of crap nor will I engage in it." Good excuse to remain ignorant. That's obviously what you want.
Originally Posted By jonvn "Global Cooling or the Ice Age was predicted from some scientists" not really, no. The maverick scientists are such because they are basically ignoring or denying the vast amount of evidence that says a certain thing. This is not a scientific attitude. It's one of dogmatism.
Originally Posted By jonvn "Public policy should never be based on questionable science." The science is not questionable. As I have said, several times now, there are no credible people researching this who have a differing viewpoint. NONE. Ignoring that makes it very easy to pretend there is some sort of question or debate, but there is none.
Originally Posted By Sport Goofy << We should stop buying oil based on price alone. We shouldn't attack oil companies for making a profit. >> Maybe we should stop having government subsidies to the oil industry so that alternatives can compete on an equal footing in energy markets.
Originally Posted By friendofdd >>>The science is not questionable. As I have said, several times now, there are no credible people researching this who have a differing viewpoint. NONE.<<< Here is a list of signers of an open letter to the UN Climate Conference, dated Dec. 13, 2007. Their credentials are listed, so you can decide if they have any credibility. There are supposed to be one hundred, but I haven't counted them. <a href="http://www.nationalpost.com/news/story.html?id=164004" target="_blank">http://www.nationalpost.com/ne ws/story.html?id=164004</a> Here is the letter. <a href="http://www.nationalpost.com/news/story.html?id=164002" target="_blank">http://www.nationalpost.com/ne ws/story.html?id=164002</a>
Originally Posted By jonvn "Here is a list of signers " I'm glad there is a list of signers. In the meantime, every single scientific organization is saying the same thing. You don't seem to really hear this, so what's the point in discussing it with you. You don't seem to get it. There is no credible dissension regarding these issues within scientific circles.
Originally Posted By friendofdd Perhaps you could refute these individuals one at a time or by groups of science discipline or geographical location.
Originally Posted By jonvn I'm not interested. Every single scientific organization that studies the issue says the same thing. All of them. Maybe when this sinks in, I can stop repeating it.
Originally Posted By woody Quote "In stark contrast to the often repeated assertion that the science of climate change is "settled," significant new peer-reviewed research has cast even more doubt on the hypothesis of dangerous human-caused global warming. But because IPCC working groups were generally instructed (see <a href="http://ipcc-wg1.ucar.edu/wg1/docs/wg1_timetable_2006-08-14.pdf" target="_blank">http://ipcc-wg1.ucar.edu/wg1/d ocs/wg1_timetable_2006-08-14.pdf</a>) to consider work published only through May, 2005, these important findings are not included in their reports; i.e., the IPCC assessment reports are already materially outdated." --- If this is true, the consensus is fundamentally defective.
Originally Posted By jonvn What it explains is that since every single scientific organization is saying the same thing, then I'm not going to be interested in what random people have to say that are trying to state otherwise, particularly when many of them are paid by the fossil fuel industry. As I have said, all of them say the same things at this point. ALL of them. And as far as post 91 goes, ignore the IPCC. Then you only have EVERY OTHER SINGLE organization that is saying just what they are. So, once again: Every scientific organization is saying the same thing. All of them. When you can find a credible organization that is saying otherwise, then you would have something. Until then, you're just fostering malarkey.
Originally Posted By Kar2oonMan Take 2: Setting aside global warming or climate change and the cause, doesn't it just make sense that we ought to be adopting stricter fuel consumption standards from automakers? Shouldn't we, as a matter of public policy, be doing all we can to create cleaner, more efficent vehicles and appliances? If somehow it turns out man's actions have zero impact on climate change, doesn't it make much greater sense in the name of national security to be working hard at developing forms of energy that don't leave us beholden to the middle east, Venezuela, etc.? Doesn't it just make sense to do all we can to reasonably protect waterways, air quality, wildlife habitats by putting our efforts into developing cleaner, "greener" forms of energy? I would think the answers to the above, from both people who accept that man has an impact on global climate change as well as people who remain skeptical, would be self-evident. Which makes this whole debate really more of a sideshow and a distraction from what is in our best national (and international) interests.
Originally Posted By DAR 2ooney you make some excellent points. Of course we should try make our air cleaner, rely on alternate fuels such hydrogen. I'm against using ethanol since it comes from corn. Which is one of our food source, by using that it's going to drive up the price. But what I am against is those of us being villified by the "global warming is man made" crowd simply because A) we might believe that the warming has to do with the Earth's natural cycles. B) We'd like to see a little more research done on the subject. Instead we're told that the discussion is over. When it comes to science the discussion is never really over.
Originally Posted By plpeters70 "Instead we're told that the discussion is over. When it comes to science the discussion is never really over." I understand where you're coming from, but the problem with these arguments is that they are being used by people in the government to stall on making changes to our energy policy. And we really can't afford to wait any longer - we need to get off oil NOW and we need to start moving to a greener economy NOW - not later. The longer we wait - the harder it's going to be to fix the problems later. And I'm not even talking about warming problems -- I'm more concerned about supply issues myself. Earth cannot support all 6 billion people living the lives of the average American consumer - and that's where we are headed. You have billions of Chinese and Indian citizens who are beginning to lead a first world lifestyle - and that's wonderful, but also taking a very heavy toll on the planet's resources. What happens when they run out?? War and famine - and that's not a time that I want to live through - and certainly not something I want to leave to the next generation. So, since we can't ask the Chinese and Indians, and everyone else, to continue leading Third World lifestyles - we need to find a way to make the First World lifestyle green and sustainable. And that takes work - work that needs to begin right now. And I'm afraid that if we continue to debate about causes of global warming and other issues, we'll miss our window of opportunity to make a difference and create an economy that is green and sustainable for all people - now and in the future.
Originally Posted By friendofdd Sorry to say this 2ooney, but you are being far to rational for this thread. Unless you can set yourself up for someone to indicate you are stupid, you'll need to go elsewhere.
Originally Posted By woody Global Warming is no different than the Evolution debate where people say it is fact and settled. But the truth is Evolution is still looking for a elegant theory. The backfilling of a incomplete and flawed theory goes on. Despite that, it is still considered fact. With Global Warming, the studies are considered settled, but it was only 40 years since the Global Cooling theories. Over a long period of time, there is no way to predict where the climate is going. But like Evolution, Global Warming alarmists have a new theory to backfill. However, if they are wrong, no one will remember and it becomes a new myth. Wipe the slate clean. Maybe the doubters will show there was no consensus and the only reason for this issue is Al Gore and his Academy Award.
Originally Posted By woody >>I understand where you're coming from, but the problem with these arguments is that they are being used by people in the government to stall on making changes to our energy policy. And we really can't afford to wait any longer - we need to get off oil NOW and we need to start moving to a greener economy NOW - not later. The longer we wait - the harder it's going to be to fix the problems later. And I'm not even talking about warming problems -- I'm more concerned about supply issues myself.<< The problem with this argument is conservation and efficiency has nothing to do with Global Warming. They are separate issues. Conflating the two makes conservation more difficult since it becomes a political issue.
Originally Posted By plpeters70 "They are separate issues." Well, they're not really seperate issues -- our uncontrolled use of fossil fuels IS causing Global Warming. But the point I was trying to make was that even if you don't agree that Global Warming is man-made, your goals for a cleaner and more energy-efficient economy should match with the goals of people trying to stop Global Warming. So, we have two groups that should ultimately have the same goal - cleaning up the environment and creating a sustainable green economy - who are fighting over causes, when they should be coming up with a solution!!
Originally Posted By Kar2oonMan ighting over causes, when they should be coming up with a solution!<< That's where I was going, too. For the resons indicated above, this fighting over the effects of global warming doesn't much matter. We STILL need to get away from fossil fuels (cost, scarcity and national security are good reasons, even if one doesn't believe they can impact climate), and the faster we do it, the better. It'll take a national effort on the scope of the moon landing, but we can do it. I wish both sides of the global warming debate instead focused on the common goals. Doesn't matter WHY we want to get there in this case so long as we get there.
