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Originally Posted by LordFu I was posting the results of their survey. I wasn't aware of their checkered past, but, in regards to the specific survey, I believe they have a point. There is no consensus on what an ideal climate is or what the consequences of the current warming trend are. |
Well yeah, of course there isn't. It doesn't really matter too much what the climate is -- be it hot or cold or whatever else, species adapt. The problem isn't how hot the Earth is though, the problem is in the fact that the climate is changing. If you have any sort of basic biology background I'm sure you know that climate change -- be it up, down, or diagonally tends to be "bad." Dying species in and of itself doesn't have to be labeled "bad," of course. The problem is in our society as humans -- historical speaking changes in climate have usually been bad news. There are many problems with global warming -- flooded cities etc and a shift in ecosystems that we have become dependent on. Scientists know that at the very least global warming isn't a good thing.
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And, you're misunderstanding me. I'm not arguing that global warming isn't occuring. I'm arguing that the impact of CO2 is overstated and not nearly as well understood as we're led to believe. There is evidence that limiting CO2 emissions is ineffective and extremely costly that is not taken into consideration.
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CO2 is definitely the largest factor on the climate. It's not the only factor, however. Current warming is something like 90% anthropogenic. It's harder to tell at the moment due to the fact that these sorts of things build on themselves overtime, and there are different feedback processes in the climate. We can look historically though at our influence in the climate.
Another study I found interesting was one published in the
Journal of Climate, "Do Models Underestimate the Solar Contribution to Recent Climate Change?" (
http://limate.envsci.rutgers.edu/pdf/StottEtAl.pdf ). Depending on the data used the solar contribution to global warming was 16% or 36% between 1950 and 1999, and the figure is only this high because of anthropogenic factors which cool the Earth such as particulate pollution (global dimming). The highest factor by far was CO2, then of particulate aerosol pollution which caused significant cooling, and there were no other significant non-anthropogenic factors identified besides the sun and a small cooling factor from volcanic activity.
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Road to Bali
"Road to Bali
Peter Foster, Financial Post
Published: Thursday, December 06, 2007
The fate of the Earth hangs in the balance in Bali, but the issue is not whether humanity will succumb to a "climate crisis," or how the international community might craft a successor to the tattered Kyoto Accord (Let's call it KyoTwo). The real theme of this United Nations gabfest -- like that of its 12 predecessors, and of the hundreds, if not thousands, of related meetings --is whether globalization and trade liberalization will be allowed to continue, with a corresponding increase in wealth, health and welfare, or whether the authoritarian enemies of freedom (who rarely if ever recognize themselves as such) will succeed in using environmental hysteria to undermine capitalism and increase their Majesterium. Any successor to Kyoto will be rooted in hobbling rich economies, increasing the poor world's resentment, unleashing environmental trade warfare, and blanketing the globe with rules and regulations that benefit only rulers and regulators. Bali is not about climate; it symbolizes the continued assault on freedom by those who seek -- or pander to -- political power under the guise of concern for humanity.
Just at the point where Marxism was being consigned to the dustbin of history, the more or less concealed power lust that had fed it found a new cause in the environment. The fact that the UN's 1992 Rio conference followed hard on the collapse of the Soviet Union represented almost the passing of a poisoned baton. Capitalism had once been the enemy because it was alleged to make people poor. Now it was the enemy because of the alleged side effects of making them rich. The emissions of carbon-based industrial society would lead to a climate in turmoil:We would be beset by Biblical plagues of floods, droughts and monster hurricanes."
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There's no need to politicize everything. I'm not entirely sure what kind of conspiracy they're tooting their horn about, what I got was they thought other economic factors were more important than global warming. Even if there are other problems facing us today, this doesn't change all the negative things that are going to happen because of global warming.
Furthermore whether or not global warming is "dangerous" has nothing to do with the fact that humans are primarily responsible for it.