Global Warming

[t19]

Sorry Stan, your boiling water analogy is bogus science, based on data collected around the world that in many cases (Russia for ex) gave summer temps in stead of fall and falsely show an increase. 

Many of the people, read scientists who supported this  science now refute it ( are you saying only Dr Susuki is not influenced by money... oh wait, he is rich... not bad for a 3d rate reporter/University Professor)

the earth has headed up and cooled off in a cycle for years... the black plague has ties to climate change...

We give ourselves too much credit to think we have this major a role to play in climate change... BTW our climate change is in sync with observations on Mars... how does Al Gore et al, explain that??

[dieselman]

It is my understanding that there are more factors than just cold weather that keep these creatures at bay.

The amont of rainfall.

The age of the trees.

Overly dense forests.

Altered species of beetles that are more tolorent to climate change.

To name a few.

Just stirrin the pot.


Jim

[AdeV73]

It's easy to get confuzzled by either side of the Anthropogenic Global Warming argument. Both sides have some very brainy scientists; both sides have a very significant of "junk" scienctists. It's also very easy to take a firm stance on one side of the fence or the other. It's also true that there's big bucks on both sides - the Petrochemical & coal industries on one side (funding some scientists & groups); governments typically on the other (funding some scientists & groups).

e.g. Q: Hansen - where does he get the bulk of his money? A: The US Government via various environmental research funds.

However, I'd like to throw a few petrol-soaked tidbits on the fire....  

1) Global Warming became Climate Change around the turn of the century, when actual global warming seemed to halt - or, at least, grow significantly less severe. The actual change in warming/cooling varies depending on whether you start at the peak year (1999 IIRC), or not.

2) Technically, we're still in an ice age: The previous ice age won't be over until the polar ice caps have permanantly melted. Permanantly, that is, until we head into the next ice age. And yes, there will be one, despite anything humankind might do.

3) The number of surface temperature stations, particularly in the contentintal US, is falling rapidly. The quality of many of those remaining stations is in doubt. See Steve McIntyre's excellent blog http://www.climateaudit.org for some seriously detailed analysis (not to mention regular attempts to analyse Hansen's latest weaving).

4) The "hockey stick" graph, showing catastrophic anthropogenic global warming, is largely based on "dendroclimateology", or the divining of world temperatures from tree ring widths. Specifically, a bunch of Bristlecone trees somewhere in California.

5) CO2 concentrations have increased - relatively linearly - since the industrial revolution really got going in the 1800s. World temperature has not even remotely kept pace with the increase of concentration - either on a linear or logarithmic relationship.

6) Most "classic" greenhouse calculations assume an infinitely thick atmosphere. Which isn't quite how it is...

7) There is precisely zero evidence to suggest a recent increase in hurricane activity, either as a result of CAGW or not. There's no truly reliable data to go on prior to the 1970s (and the advent of satellite monitoring), however, someone recently did an analysis of ship's logs going waay back, which showed that weather isn't becoming systematically more variable with increased temperatures.

Oh, hell, I could go on. But I won't. Instead, I'd advocate 2 websites:

http://www.realclimate.org - run by catastrophic anthropogenic global warmists; who are largely funded by the US taxpayer (and the EU and UK taxpayers, to a lesser extent); most of the research being to find further global warming signals in amongst the masses & masses of noise.
http://www.climateaudit.org - run by a lone statistician who's out to debunk "junk science" (he says) in the climate "science" field.

Oh, and one final parting shot: Remember, you can build a computer model to model anything you like. And if reality doesn't behave itself? Why, you just fiddle with the rules in your model until it matches reality again; claim your model is now "better", and use it to predict doom, gloom, death, destruction and any number of nice fat new research grants....

[mobile_bob]

about a year ago, scientific american ran an article on ocean temps
seems there are a few thousand sensor bobbing around the world oceans all linked via satalite to a base puter somewhere

over the last 20 years the oceans temps rose an average of 1.8 degree's C
the last year they got results, 2005 or 2006 iirc the oceans temps dropped 1.6 degree's in one year
nearly negating all the temp rise of the previous 20 years.

now i suppose scientific american could also be bought off by big oil and coal, but good grief
this is getting to be a stretch that they are buying off everyone.

we as humans look at this earth from a narrow viewpoint, with us being the center of the universe
this old rock has been here for a very long time and will be here long after we are gone.

why is it so hard to believe that this whole thing is cyclical? we know the sun is cyclical don't we?
sun gets hotter so will we, it gets cooler so will we.

this is not to say we can't crap in our nest and make area's unfit for habitation, but even chernobyl only took
about 25 years to clean itself without human intervention, every form of life is back living there now in spades
i remember the scientists telling us it would be inhospitable to life for something like 1000s of years.

yes we can make a mess, but it is pretty well been proven we can make a much bigger mess trying to undo or tinker with
mother nature.

besides humans are war loving creatures, we can't agree on anything, yet we expect everyone to get on board and do something
about global warming? ya right!

if we in canada and the us quit burning coal and oil tomorrow, it wouldn't make a bit of difference, india and china among others will step up
and fill the gap and if humans are guilty of altering the climate it will continue to go that way anyway. thats a big "if" in my opinion.

everytime algore opens his mouth i am automatically suspect, and after the nobel folks gave him the prize i no longer have any faith in their
opinions either. i mean comeon he is no scientist he is a friggin politician! as such he carries or should carry all the scientific clout of a washed up hollywood actor.

crap i would rather trust a washed up hollywood actor that played a scientist in a B grade movie, at least he would no a test tube from
a condom.

it never ceases to amaze me how this global warming crap has taken root so deeply, i am old enough to remember all the bruha in the 70's that we were assuredly slipping into an iceage. i bought into that crap then because i was young, once bitten twice shy is now my motto.

as for the beetles it has been proven that humans fighting forest fires is the root cause of their proliferation, before we got into fighting fires
lightening would strike and huge tracts would go up in smoke,, does anyone think the indian fought back those fires, or practiced forest managment?

no matter what happens the beetles will kill those tree's, they will get very dry and a huge fire will clean the whole problem out.
and then 30-50 years later the forest will again be healthy and vibrant, its just natures way of flushing the toilet.
it isn't going to be pleasant for folks working or living there, but that is the way nature works.

we are not the center of the universe, just a player in the game.

bob g

[Stan]

"no matter what happens the beetles will kill those tree's, they will get very dry and a huge fire will clean the whole problem out.
and then 30-50 years later the forest will again be healthy and vibrant, its just natures way of flushing the toilet.
it isn't going to be pleasant for folks working or living there, but that is the way nature works.

Easy to say when you're not surrounded by them dead red trees Bob!  Will you come up here and help fight that fire?
Stan

[mobile_bob]

Stan:

i am not trying to be smug or anything like that, and i can appreciate the problem it causes for those that live near those tree's

you asked if i would come help fight the fire?

the answer would be no, and i won't be living in hurricane country, or on a flood plane either. however
if i hear that you have been burned out of house and home i would contribute to a fund to aid you and other afflicted by the problem, once!

after which i would expect you to build else where if the threat still exists,

see the thing is, if we blame man for the problem, then we need to blame man for trying to stop mother nature from cleaning up the problem with a fire.
man puts out the fire and the problem still exists, maybe a percentage of the bugs get bbq'd or smoked out, but until the area is burned off
it will only get worse.

alternatively man could go in there and cut down all the infected tree's and let the bugs eat those, but the bugs will likely only propagate more?

i don't have an answer for you, i don't like the problem any more than you do, i like tree's but am not a tree hugger.

how else are you going to exterminate these bugs? surely you don't suggest waiting till the next iceage for them to freeze out?
it is doubtful that any pesticide will be approved to kill them, if there were such a plan it would take 20 years to get through all the approval
processes.

i don't see any other outcome but a massive fire at some point, maybe you should clear your immediate area just in case?

what is being done to combat these bugs anyway? what can be done?

bob g

[Stan]

Jens, the wood is useless commercially because the beetle carries with it a fungus that dyes the wood blue.  No one wants to build a house out of blue stained wood, they think it's infected.  The best thing that can be done with it is to turn it into wood pellets.  There's trillions of dead trees though and they will be rotten in 3 to 5 years!

Did a little googling on this Mark Morano and the senator he works for.  He's (Senator Inhofe)  about as right wing as you can get!  Makes Ghengis Khan look like a commie!

Senator Inhofe is a notorious climate-change denier, and generally an all-round right wing nut, opposed to pretty much anything that would constrain the ability of companies to ravage the environment. He's a Republican from Oklahoma, and so he's no longer the head of this committtee.  That would have been the senate committee on the environment and public works, what a hoot!    How could a guy who has publically criticized the Red Cross as a "bleeding heart" [organization] ever get appointed to a position like that!
 
His Wikipedia entry also quotes some of his interesting beliefs regarding Israel, gay rights, and torture: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Inhofe
 
From his own website bio:
 
"Jim was recently voted the "Most Outstanding Conservative U.S. Senator" by Human Events Newspaper and the American Conservative Union.  He repeatedly receives various awards and recognitions, including the "Lifetime Service Award" from the Oklahoma Independent Petroleum Association, the National Taxpayers Association's "Friends of the Taxpayer" Award, the "Hero of the Taxpayer Award" from Americans for Tax Reform, the American Farm Bureau's "Friend of the Farm Bureau" Award, the Center for Security Policy's "Keeper of the Flame" Award, the U.S. Chamber of Commerce's "Spirit of Enterprise" Award, and an "A+" rating from the National Rifle Association."

OH yah, that was a great article to cite as an example of "accurate representation of truth and clarity". 

Did I say something in a previous post about a conspiracy theory?  I take that back, I think it's proven now.

Stan

[mobile_bob]

damn Stan:

that jim guy form oklahoma sounds like my kind of guy

i guess it all comes down to ones point of view or perspective
sorta like which side of the fence one stands on?

certainly would rather trust the congressman from oklahoma with my family far sooner than i would barney frank, chuck schumer, diane feinstein, harry reed or countless other liberal whackjobs that are bought and paid for by union leaders.



politics, religion, sex and global warming,
things you don't discuss in polite company i guess?

when you get right down to it, global warming is the intersection of the latter three
global warming surely is political, it has become a religion, and before it is overwith those that beat the drum
will have us all bending over and taking it up the tailpipe,, (kinda like rough sex, but without a kiss)



ok, i will leave it alone now, we can agree to disagree if that is ok with you?

bob g

[Stan]

Yup I agree, our famous pseudo Liberal premier dragged his a$$ on this rather than admit global warming was the culprit, and now that he has officially recognized the problem, it's too late to rescue Quesnel, Williams Lake, Prince George etc. etc.....Oh well, come May 12th, he'll find out where he went wrong.

Bob, yup, I agree we'll disagree.  I'm not trying to change anyone's mind on this issue anyway, you can't change a man's politics or religeous beliefs, I found that out in my days as an evangelist tent preacher    Just kidding. 

I expect one of these days we'll have the evidence staring us in the face and then one of us still won't believe it anyway! 
Stan

[compig]

Anyone remember the smog problem in LA that caused the EPA to jump on cars from a great height in the 60's / 70's ?  Has that issue been resolved by catalytic converters ?  There was a similar issue in the heavily industrialised area's of the UK just before the war due to coal burning. London even had it's own form of fog branded a "pea souper". Passengers in cars had to get out and walk in front to guide the driver along the fog was that dense.

[compig]

Man should not pollute the planet , I agree. Problem now is that it has become a political and financial issue. Pro Green lobby want pollution of any sort to immediately cease , the Global Warming non believers say it's not Man and it's too costly to met all the targets created by whoever.
Basically , IMO , man has ignored the environmental issue for too long. Had Domestic and Industrial energy consumption been minimised 25 years ago we would not have had the problems that now plague the global population.
Now we all face the emergence of new super economies that threaten to transcend anything the industrial revolution has so far inflicted. An opportunity to make massive progress in halting the escalation of global pollution has been missed.
How about this for something to be concerned about , the total energy consumed by instigating 2 Google searches would boil a domestic kettle !!  Multiply that by the growth we have yet to see in global internet use and that in itself is a problem of Biblical magnitude.

[mobile_bob]

while i might appear to be a strong opponent of global warming, i am no proponent of crapping in the nest either.

certainly we can use regulation to gradually clean things up or improve quality, we just can't do it overnight in my opinion.

far better to lead by example rather than by the spoken word, kind of hard to listen to algore when he flies obsolete jets all over the
place releasing tons of carbon, has several homes the size of one which would house 6 families comfortably by 1950's standards, rides in limo's that likely get a quarter the mileage of less of something more reasonable.

i just don't like being told what to do, what i must do, by folks that have no intention of liveing by the same rules.

maybe it is an american thing, maybe because we don't live under the crown and havent for a very long time now.

maybe some of you canadians have lived under the crown so long that it seems reasonable to you that you should live like a peasant and be told how you must live by folks that live in castles.

me? i saw pick up you torches and pitchforks already!!!

time for you canadians to stand on your own two feet, and kick england off your shores as well.

as for this global warming issue and how i choose to live my life personally
i don't for a second believe that there is good science and evidence that man is responcible for 10% of what we are blamed for, hiowever
i choose to make my life as carbon neutral as possible, not because i have too, but because it makes sense to me to live smaller, simpler
and cleaner,,,  mainly because it is sustainable (by me) and cheaper (for me) to do so.

and if it is viewed by the greenies and a good thing, well thats ok by me as well, and
if it is viewed by the greenies as not doing enough, well thats ok by me too.

bob g

[Stan]

Yah, actually we are a form of a monarchy (constitutional in fact)  with the queen as titular head of state.
Stan

[t19]

Basically , IMO , man has ignored the environmental issue for too long. Had Domestic and Industrial energy consumption been minimised 25 years ago we would not have had the problems that now plague the global population.
Now we all face the emergence of new super economies that threaten to transcend anything

I have no problem about programs to stop dumping crap in to our waterways... 100% behind it

Its this bogus argument about warming or change... get over it climate changes.  Lets do something that will make a difference, not something like Y2K that only helps a few consultants

[AdeV73]

There was a similar issue in the heavily industrialised area's of the UK just before the war due to coal burning. London even had it's own form of fog branded a "pea souper".

London's pea-soupers of old (aka London Smog) were largely caused by coal-burning to heat the home. It became illegal to burn coal (or any smokey fuel) as a home heating fuel in London sometime after the famous 1952 pea-souper which killed thousands.