I have doubts about carbon-based climate change

[Levin]

Originally Posted by MikeWaters

When did we stop wringing our hands about acid rain and the ozone layer?

Oh yeah, when it became all the rage to talk about global warming.

It's the new secular liberal religion.

Your ignorance is showing. Might want to cover that up.

A tiny bit of research would reveal that we've done a great deal to address acid rain and ozone depletion, and been quite successful about it. The ozone hole is large, but the Montreal Protocol has been a great success, and the prediction is that by mid-century, the ozone layer will have healed itself.

Regulation of pollutants that cause acid rain have also been successful. Though acid rain is still a problem, the mobilization effort worked, and we're on our way to recovery.

Once you baptize a person, you move on to the next door. No need savin' what's already been saved. I'm not saying we should be complacent about ozone and acid rain, but we have laws and agreements in place that are addressing those problems, and there's already been improvement. It's wise and prudent direct your mobilizing efforts to problems without solutions in place, like global climate change.

The cry of the ignorant will always be the same: "You're a zealot, just like you were back in the day." Yep, and back in the day we did some good. In fact, those fish you like to catch, they're healthier b/c of our zealotry. And your skin cancer? Yep, you would have already died if not for our zealotry. Your kids too. You're welcome.

[MikeWaters]

Deforestation might or might not counteract increased plant growth.

To what degree is deforestation and cow flatulence leading to increased greenhouse gases, as compared to fossil fuels?

Do we believe the earth is its ideal temperature right now? Why is this ideal? What is the ideal? If there are natural cycles of warming and cooling, is our goal to prevent those?

[Levin]

Originally Posted by MikeWaters

Deforestation might or might not counteract increased plant growth.

To what degree is deforestation and cow flatulence leading to increased greenhouse gases, as compared to fossil fuels?

Do we believe the earth is its ideal temperature right now? Why is this ideal? What is the ideal? If there are natural cycles of warming and cooling, is our goal to prevent those?

Dumb questions. Sorry, just being honest.

Our goal is to let the Earth's natural climate cycles take their course without human activities artificially accelerating the changes.

And forget the environment: why would you ever want to continue sending your dollars to petrodictators in Russia, the Middle East, South America, and elsewhere? Weaning ourselves from carbon emitting energy sources is a win-win-win-win on all fronts -- environmentally, economically, national security, ethically, etc.

But by all means, keep burning the cow dung to heat your hut. I'd like to enjoy the fruits of human progress.

[MikeWaters]

Originally Posted by Levin

Dumb questions. Sorry, just being honest.

Our goal is to let the Earth's natural climate cycles take their course without human activities artificially accelerating the changes.

And forget the environment: why would you ever want to continue sending your dollars to petrodictators in Russia, the Middle East, South America, and elsewhere? Weaning ourselves from carbon emitting energy sources is a win-win-win-win on all fronts -- environmentally, economically, national security, ethically, etc.

But by all means, keep burning the cow dung to heat your hut. I'd like to enjoy the fruits of human progress.

Translation: I don't know the answers to your questions, thus resorting to ad hominem.

I am asking a simple question. What % of increases in greenhouse gases are due to the consumption of fossil fuels?

[MikeWaters]

On the PBS show I was listening to, they talked about tree rings, and how they are indicators of global warming/temperature. They "work" before 1960, but don't "work" after 1960. So when they model with tree rings, they have to "fix" the post-1960 data.

WTF?

I was just reading the "Global Warming" page on wikipedia. According to it, they don't know how clouds work. Whether they increase or decrease tempertures. Reassuring right?

YET THERE IS NO DOUBT!!!!!! IT IS BEYOND QUESTIONING!!!!! IT IS TRUER THAN ANY GOD EVER WILL BE!!!!! WE MUST ACT NOW OR WE ARE DOOMED!!!!

[Levin]

Originally Posted by MikeWaters

Translation: I don't know the answers to your questions, thus resorting to ad hominem.

I am asking a simple question. What % of increases in greenhouse gases are due to the consumption of fossil fuels?

Translation: I gave you the answer to your most relevant question. And instead of admitting your idiocy regarding the obvious rebuttal to your "increased vegetation" argument (deforestation; we're not living in a new-age jungle), you turn to professor mode of questioning instead of responding.

Don't know the specific % -- lots of man-influenced causes are increasing the prevalance of greenhouse gases: fossil fuels; deforestation; cattle farming; peat-swamp destruction; etc., etc., etc. Yep, decreasing reliance on fossil fuels is one of the goals; as is reigning in deforestation; swamp destruction; etc. Not sure what we can do about the cattle flatulence.

[MikeWaters]

I was listening to a climate scientist on NPR who said that even if CO2 is as important as the true believers say, the kinds of cuts that are discussed will have no appreciable impacts in the best computer models.

[Archaea]

Originally Posted by Levin

Translation: I gave you the answer to your most relevant question. And instead of admitting your idiocy regarding the obvious rebuttal to your "increased vegetation" argument (deforestation; we're not living in a new-age jungle), you turn to professor mode of questioning instead of responding.

Don't know the specific % -- lots of man-influenced causes are increasing the prevalance of greenhouse gases: fossil fuels; deforestation; cattle farming; peat-swamp destruction; etc., etc., etc. Yep, decreasing reliance on fossil fuels is one of the goals; as is reigning in deforestation; swamp destruction; etc. Not sure what we can do about the cattle flatulence.

EAT MOR CHIKIN.

Levin all you or I can do is assemble the arguments of those that favor the position we are seeking to advocate.

So it's just an argument bash.

However, those who seek to contend that man-made CO2 is the end-all, be-all to global climate change and that the costs of making such cuts will result in material changes often appear to be arguing simplistically, in terms of causation, not correlation, and ignore the stochastic realities of the complex nature involved.

When I listen to your side versus Richard Lindzen, he sounds more convincing.

http://www-eaps.mit.edu/faculty/lind...Senate2001.pdf

and lest you believe that's too old, here's a writing from him a few weeks ago.

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB1000...917025400.html

Mike was just showing how really uncertain and how silly the risks in comparison to the huge costs to be incurred in the pursuit of something that may not be even necessary.

Review this and the following:

That said, the main greenhouse substances in the earth's atmosphere are water vapor and high clouds. Let's refer to these as major greenhouse substances to distinguish them from the anthropogenic minor substances. Even a doubling of CO2 would only upset the original balance between incoming and outgoing radiation by about 2%. This is essentially what is called "climate forcing."

More importantly, Dr. Lindzen wrote,

The IPCC's Scientific Assessments generally consist of about 1,000 pages of text. The Summary for Policymakers is 20 pages. It is, of course, impossible to accurately summarize the 1,000-page assessment in just 20 pages; at the very least, nuances and caveats have to be omitted. However, it has been my experience that even the summary is hardly ever looked at. Rather, the whole report tends to be characterized by a single iconic claim.


The main statement publicized after the last IPCC Scientific Assessment two years ago was that it was likely that most of the warming since 1957 (a point of anomalous cold) was due to man. This claim was based on the weak argument that the current models used by the IPCC couldn't reproduce the warming from about 1978 to 1998 without some forcing, and that the only forcing that they could think of was man. Even this argument assumes that these models adequately deal with natural internal variability—that is, such naturally occurring cycles as El Nino, the Pacific Decadal Oscillation, the Atlantic Multidecadal Oscillation, etc.

You're actually playing fast and loose with the facts Levin if you don't make the distinctions Dr. Lindzen is. Have you read all 1000 pages and are you ready to discuss the scientific nuances in the "forcing" issue which sought to identify man as the cause?

And he shows informally,

Thus even the basis for the weak IPCC argument for anthropogenic climate change was shown to be false.

Every time I read him or hear him debate I become convinced the proponents of GATA are simply deceivers lying in wait for more Congressional grants and to affect the petrochemical industry.

[Levin]

You got me. I'll just be honest. I hate petrodictators. I don't know or care whether our CO2 emissions are causing the Earth to warm. I just want an excuse to stop sending them our billions. And I've never gotten over the Exxon Valdez spill. I hate Exxon and want it to die a slow, agonizing death.

[MikeWaters]

Originally Posted by Levin

You got me. I'll just be honest. I hate petrodictators. I don't know or care whether our CO2 emissions are causing the Earth to warm. I just want an excuse to stop sending them our billions. And I've never gotten over the Exxon Valdez spill. I hate Exxon and want it to die a slow, agonizing death.

CG_Climategate rears its ugly head.

Ideologue playing hard and fast with the "facts".