[OT] Man-made global warming : myth or fact?

[Machinesworking]

But again, that's not this debate. It's fine if you think the debate is moot. But whether you can find an argument to make the debate moot is not the debate itself, which I believe is what this thread is about.

Do you really think a bunch of musicians are capable of predicting whether or not global warming is real?
or that any of us will have better answers than thousands of climate scientists on the subject?
The videos posted point out a simple fact, the debate is pointless, the answer is to accept that world destruction isn't an option.
That, should be the debate IMO, not what we untrained masses think is possible, but what the consequences of that thinking will transpire.

Personally I hope it is man-made and we do nothing about it. But I just want to watch the world burn.

Yeah I'm guilty of being misanthropic at times, but here's a sickening statistic from Carl Sagan for you.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RB_v99FSTYc
Makes me at least hope for a better outcome.

[naujpablo]

A lie.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FfHW7KR33IQ

[LoopStationZebra]

But again, that's not this debate. It's fine if you think the debate is moot. But whether you can find an argument to make the debate moot is not the debate itself, which I believe is what this thread is about.

Do you really think a bunch of musicians are capable of predicting whether or not global warming is real?
or that any of us will have better answers than thousands of climate scientists on the subject?
The videos posted point out a simple fact, the debate is pointless, the answer is to accept that world destruction isn't an option.
That, should be the debate IMO, not what we untrained masses think is possible, but what the consequences of that thinking will transpire.

Personally I hope it is man-made and we do nothing about it. But I just want to watch the world burn.

Yeah I'm guilty of being misanthropic at times, but here's a sickening statistic from Carl Sagan for you.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RB_v99FSTYc
Makes me at least hope for a better outcome.

.


Does a majority of anything mean that it's right and fact? Does the fact that we are untrained mean that we should accept whatever science tells us as fact? Hmm. Some of the most significant and amazing discoveries about electricity were in fact made by mere layman/hobbyists who were simply curious, started experimenting, and turned the world on it's head.

[stringtapper]

Do you really think a bunch of musicians are capable of predicting whether or not global warming is real?
or that any of us will have better answers than thousands of climate scientists on the subject?
The videos posted point out a simple fact, the debate is pointless, the answer is to accept that world destruction isn't an option.
That, should be the debate IMO, not what we untrained masses think is possible, but what the consequences of that thinking will transpire.

Just as long as it's clear that you're not actually participating in this debate, but letting us know that you think that we should be debating something else. That's all I was saying.

As far as predictions, I never said anything about predicting anything at all. If everyone has to be an expert to debate something, then most people shouldn't debate on much of anything.

Personally I hope it is man-made and we do nothing about it. But I just want to watch the world burn.

Yeah I'm guilty of being misanthropic at times, but here's a sickening statistic from Carl Sagan for you.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RB_v99FSTYc
Makes me at least hope for a better outcome.

In the end it's a moral question. One that to me that is no different than a moral dilemma a religious person might have. Don't assume that mass destruction is not an option for some people.

[adventurepants_]

Can of worms indeed.

Couple of quick random points.

There is currently no recognised scientific body that disagrees with the accepted findings of Anthropogenic Climate Change. The mainstream consensus among the people who brought you Gravity, Spaceflight and Computers largely believe this is real. There is however enormous debate about interpretation of the findings.

People who talk about a global conspiracy of scientists colluding to line their own pockets are batshit crazy. Go check out the carpark of the science faculty at a major university, then checkout the Law or Engineering carparks and tell me whos making money.

Finally, if I hear the term 'save the planet' any longer Im going to explode. Whatever happens, the planet will be just fine. We could let off every nuclear weapon at once and the planet would be fine and life would flourish again in a few tens of millions of years. I wish we would concentrate our language on 'saving our own particular skins' instead of this more noble sounding saving the planet hogwash.

[stringtapper]

Finally, if I hear the term 'save the planet' any longer Im going to explode. Whatever happens, the planet will be just fine. We could let off every nuclear weapon at once and the planet would be fine and life would flourish again in a few tens of millions of years. I wish we would concentrate our language on 'saving our own particular skins' instead of this more noble sounding saving the planet hogwash.

Precisely. "Save my ass" is what it should be.

With all the bitching people do about the things we as humans do every day I am almost amazed anyone would actually want to save humanity. I know I don't.

[Machinesworking]

@naujpablo
Wow? that video was a total waste of time, not any mention of scientists saying Climate Change is likely, because they don't want to mention the overwhelming majority that agree with Gore etc.


Here's a simple fact!

The finding that the climate has warmed in recent decades and that this warming is likely attributable to human influence has been endorsed by every national science academy that has issued a statement on climate change, including the science academies of all of the major industrialized countries. At present, no scientific body of national or international standing has issued a dissenting statement. A small minority of professional associations have issued noncommittal statements.

@adventurepants, dead on, getting rid of mankind would be easy, getting rid of all life on this planet would require focused attention to doing just that. Cockroaches ftw!

[glitchrock-buddha]

A lie.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FfHW7KR33IQ

Well thank heavens for fox news. When nobody else will allow the truth to be told, you can always count on good ol' fox.

[hoffman2k]

Even if its a myth, I'd rather be breathing air than smog.

Agreeing with Global Warming isn't going to get me that damn jetpack. Though I was never keen on the idea on having that much firepower aimed at my legs anyway.
Solar and Wind power, clean air, a new industrial revolution, saving parts of the world that may hold cures and undiscovered species, using food for ehrm food, etc..

If you argue against global warming, what are you really arguing against?
Sure, windmills kill birds. But you could fix that with some damn sirens or go nuts and use scarecrows. But I'll take those dead birds over an oil spill near our local bird sanctuaries.

Hehe.. What a can of worms indeed. There's just too big of a picture.
Clean energy = No oil tankers spilling shit on my beach
No oil dependence = No need to bug the middle east for a refill
No need for nuclear energy = No more lame excuses for whoever wants to enrich. First step to building down the nuclear arsenal

Wishful thinking, I know. But I'd rather smoke a chimney than to walk through Athens on a bad day.

This is a typical misdirection of the debate.

"Well I don't want to get into the debate, so let's just talk about how being environmentally conscious in general can be a good thing."

No reasonable person thinks it's a good thing to pollute. But we're not talking about whether it's good to pollute. We're talking about whether what have been perceived as drastic climate changes in the last century are due to human action.

But of course going off topic is the norm on this board...

I honestly don't understand why knowing if its caused by us or not is important. If the answer is no, what makes it different? The only upside it has is that polluters have yet another useless statistic to support their actions.
If the answer is yes, the greens have a useless statistic to support their inaction.

Its pompous to think we can destroy the earth. The earth can take care of itself.
We can definitely kill ourselves, but so can a volcano.
Saying anything more and I'd be ripping off George Carlin.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eScDfYzMEEw

I'm not an environmentalist. I probably pollute more than I recycle.
I just see Global Warming as the next step to our technological revolution.
Clean energy isn't the most important thing. Renewable energy is. You enjoy paying utility bills?
But thats me. I'd side with Satan if I knew he'd be the ticket to holodecks and lightsabers. For now I'll just side with Al Gore. After all, "Al Gore faces defeat after Global Warming was debunked by the Internet that he invented".

[Machinesworking]

In the end it's a moral question. One that to me that is no different than a moral dilemma a religious person might have. Don't assume that mass destruction is not an option for some people.

Not a moral question at all IMO. A survival of the species question. I think life is programed to propagate itself to the degree that a mother will sacrifice herself for her children. This isn't just a homo sapien or mammal thing, there are hundreds of species that will kill themselves for their offspring. It's possible that humans are not wired for that as a race. To me, that's not a moral question, but a question of what ideas do we take on as a species? We accept that we are selfish and violent, and that's what we get, we accept that we are capable of both violence and charity and that I think is what you see around this planet, that we are capable of both.

Simply put, I do not think that a species as highly advanced as we are would have survived for as long as we have had we not had a "woman and children first" code programmed into our DNA. That sort of code is the same drive that will hopefully prevent ourselves from destroying ourselves.

Like I said I'm guilty of misanthropic thinking all the time etc. but I categorically refuse to accept what I see as a Judeo-Christian gothic death trip, IE mankind is ruthless and evil by nature and is doomed to force the End Times etc. It's as one sided as hippies who think people are going to have a paradigm shift in consciousness and become all loving and caring etc.

[Aeroplay]

In my opinion it's not really about global warming. We have to dig deeper. It's definetly a fact that we are totaly fucking up the unique and wonderful pearl that our planet is. It's not just about CO2, but a billion of environment-destroying factors. The main reason is that money rules the world, and money often is a very bad regent...

[gjm]

I do not pretend to understand this in full, but where does the suns cyclical rise and fall in temp fit in? There is talk/evidence that there is in actual fact 5 planets in our system that are heating up as well as earth. Its just that earth has a different atmosphere make up and added human pressure. One thing I am quite sure of is the old adage '...it's never one thing.' I think it applies in this case. I am not saying that humanity is not helping this along, but just like the Nature/Nurture debate, polar positions are not helpful.

[adventurepants_]

One idea that I wish would gain some traction in the popular imagination is an 'Apollo Program' for renewable energy.

In 10 years the US (and the USSR to an extent) devoted a percentage of their entire GDP to cracking the manned spaceflight problem. Entire fields of science and engineering were developed overnight that are still providing concrete benefits to society today.

If this approach was taken to finding renewable energy for base load power generation, it would be cracked in a decade.

In the 60s, they had the fear of a totalitarian dictatorship being able to weaponise space. Today we dont have any fear except the vague idea that our childrens children may find life difficult. How about the 'Watchmen' approach? Convince the populace that an alien power will destroy us in 10 years if we dont use renewables.

[Jan Holm]

Was going to write a bunch of stuff, but..
Best videos on this I've seen:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zORv8wwiadQ
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AE6Kdo1A ... re=channel
Really can't poke any holes in these, if any of you can, then I'm interested in your reasoning.

Here you go.

His view is based on his own live, his standard of living so to speak. Now if
you live in a developing country you cannot get up to western life standards on
solar and wind. The kind of energi needed to power a modern well educated country
currently needs non green sources. I believe overpopulating the earth is a bigger
problem - education and better life standards are the best medicine for that.

Co2 is and global warming is a HOAX. Polution and powerty is not. I'm all for socalled
green energy. Not because of "global warming" but because our current resources are not
able to supply every person on earth with my life standard.

The only thing constant about climate is change.

[8O]

Best videos on this I've seen:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zORv8wwiadQ

I've seen that one before (probably last time around, on here ). Thing is, you can apply his same logic to the concept of a religious hell - the worst that could happen is pretty terrifying in hell. So, by his logic, the cost of changing your life just in case there's a hell, is worth it. So we should all become devout Christians (or whatever) on this basis... This is just from memory from watching the video first time round, feel free to point out the flaws in this comparison...