But... you see... he doesn't take it seriously. That somehow means he ultimately has the remotest clue about what he's talking about.

JonC and Emon: just for the record, it's really, really easy to "win" an argument when you start arguing over something the other person never said. Maybe that's what he means by the "elite" -- you guys who are so smart you can read people's minds over the internet and argue with what you think their personal thoughts are rather than what they actually wrote. It's really quite amazing.

I'd be surprised if many people drew a different conclusion about what you were implying. The main reason is that we see one word 'Interesting...' posts with links all the time, and as far as I know you're the only person whose meaning has differed from the norm.

(Normally an 'Interesting...' post means 'take a look at this smoking gun')

Plus, you know, normally people who aren't just looking for a smoking gun don't reply to a three page detailed response from a research scientist with "**** you, I'll believe what I want."

Edit: Oh, I'm sorry. "You didn't say what I wanted to hear so I stopped reading after one sentence." Means something different where Brian's from.

Seriously, we're still arguing about what "interesting" means? Why don't you open a dictionary and look it up. So I found a story about the green river killer interesting, it doesn't mean I think everyone should go around killing prostitutes.

I noticed that not one person responded to my post about what I actually think -- so what, I'm a bad guy for stating I'm ignoring a specific post for a really good reason (clearly it was in response to something I didn't say), but you all are so much better than me because you ignore it silently? Bwa bwa bwa

I'm tired of debating my true intentions when I say the word "interesting" -- I think I'll just agree with you all so you can feel better. Yes, I think global warming is bunk. Yes, I think all scientists are morons, especially the really smart ones. Yes, I'm a complete dumbass who knows nothing about anything, especially about common words in the English language. Yes, Obama is a God among men and he really does deserve that nobel prize after all. Sorry to disturb your thread.

Hear hear!

You're right, Brian, it's an annoyance I've run into frequently (here and elsewhere on the internet): people are more interested in taking potshots at your last post (or one a few pages ago, if it's convenient) than actually having a discussion. So I'm sorry for contributing to that.

Exactly this. Almost every time I see "interesting" followed by a link or copy-pasted article, it's a passive-aggressive attempt to argue without actually saying anything. I believe Brian when he says he wasn't trying to make any kind of point, but it's hard to blame the other posters in this thread, who are already in dealing-with-Wookie mode, for jumping to conclusions.

In the context of the thread, it shouldn't be so hard to see why that came across the way it did.

I havent read this thread since the third page and I can tell you...

you suck!


HAH TAKE THAT

Well, when you consider the politeness with which I used to carry myself in discussions and debate here and I was treated the same as I am now. Actually, not from the beginning. There was a continual decline in the atmosphere here which, coincidentally, seemed to lead to a major event in Massassi history. hmmm

Massassi has events? Or history? Or atmosphere?

yes! and right now the first two are in danger because of anthropogenic forumchange caused by all the E[sup]g[/sup]O[sup]2[/sup] being spewed into the forums atmosphere! if the massassi elite do not do something NOW to curb their emissions then the forums might become unlivable within the next 20 minutes! species like the north/eastern Atlantic Baconfish may become extinct!

Are we dead yet?!

But the biggest contribution to anthropogenic forumchange is the elevated levels of Wookiedioxide (WO2) in the Massassi atmosphere. The current concentration of WO2 in the atmosphere is 387 parts per million (ppm), and never in last 10,000 years has Massassi experienced WO2 levels above 280 ppm. We must identify the members that emit the most WO2 and come to an agreement to reduce WO2 levels by 2020. Irreversible forumchange is a very real and dangerous threat to all Massassians.

My whole beef is this:
1. Global Warming, by 90% or better, is caused by a cycle that the Earth goes through that is driven by both internal and external forces for which we have absolutely no control over. In 50-100 more years we'll be talking about Global Cooling.
2. Point No. 1 is not highlighted enough in the debate.

That's not to say we shouldn't be more efficient in how we conduct our daily business on our planet. However, my concern is that the industrialized world will now try to push these requirements onto developing nations and thus slowing their progress (when they have very very very little effect on 'Global Warming'). My next concern is the use of "Going Green" as a marketing ploy. I saw "Green" (recycled) trash bags in the store the other day. They were almost twice the price of the other trash bags that (when you read the printing on the box you discovered that they too) were made of recycled plastics.

How much has Al Gore made on speeches, books, etc.?

More then anything else, this seems like a huge money making scheme...

how do you know?

Which part?

Global Warming is part of a cycle? The ice core data illustrates that.

That we'll be talking about Global Cooling in the next 50-100 years? I don't know that for certain. They were talking about it in the 70's. The indicators point to the possibility that we've pretty much peaked for this warming cycle. In fact, most local data in the US has shown temperatures trending downward overall since 2000.

yeah, sorry, the "global warming is natural" mainly.

I am a bit confused now, I read the following article, its short answer at the end is "no",

http://scienceblogs.com/illconsidered/2006/02/this-is-just-natural-cycle.php

and it mentions "ice cores" too, but I don't quite understand if for pro or contra, and it (the containing document: http://scienceblogs.com/illconsidered/2008/07/how_to_talk_to_a_sceptic.php) also has a "rebuttal"? for "it's actually cooling now"

(maybe it's outdated, I just notice, since it's from 2006)

There are indeed natural phenomena that contribute to climate change and cause natural cycles in atmospheric conditions. However, point no. 1 can be shown to be demonstrably wrong[1] [2] [3] [4]when you measure the contribution from these sources and compare with what we observe in the atmosphere. When we correct for natural variability, we still observe that the anthropogenic contribution is far more significant than any natural cycle that usually affect our climate.
Every one of these measurements has a quantifiable uncertainty with them, and that's why climate change has been discussed in academia for the last 40 years (discussing exactly your point 1) but only in the last 10 or 20 years have we had the accuracy to determine with confidence the immediacy and severity of climate change and our contribution to it.





On this point, I do agree with you. There is indeed a somewhat sinister use of 'green' marketing for PR purposes to hide the actual damage done by particular corporations or policies. Such as Bush's Clear Skies Act of 2003, that actually weakened air pollution laws, and the flat out lies made by Suzuki, SEAT, Toyota and Lexus is advertising 'green' credentials. The fact that so many products are falsely advertising green credentials while not actually reducing their carbon footprint at all makes it near impossible for consumers to make any sort of ethical consideration for what they consume.

I also think there's a problem with various political groups (usually left-wing green socialists) hijacking climate change as a cause for their own, and disregarding genuine solutions because it conflicts with their political manifesto. I think a lot of people that don't want to believe in anthropogenic climate change are just opposed to these radical groups, and are concerned that radical lifestyle changes will be forced upon them from above as a necessary consequence of accepting the science.

While I may be somewhat sympathetic to these groups in the wider scheme of things, I think it is ultimately damaging to the single issue of climate change and an international agreement to tackle it. There are solutions to climate change that do not radically overthrow capitalism or make us all live in teepees and eat pineapples and smoke marijuana. They may not be quite as much fun, but they're far more realistic.

I see our response to climate change as a great opportunity to invest in science and create new jobs and new industries. On May 25, 1961 JFK announced that in 10 years, the US would land a man on the moon. This was not just to capture imagination and kindle patriotism in conflict with the Soviets, this was also because of the economic benefit to key states in the next election (Texas in particular). With that political motivation, science achieved in 10 years what was thought utterly impossible in the 10 years prior.

We can achieve tremendous and amazing things, if there is the political will to do them. This is purely what the issue of climate change needs. The science for preventing dangerous climate change already exists, the industry for alternate technologies already exists, the knowledge of how to do all of this already exists. All that remains is the political motivation to actually do it.

And you're quite right, I think it is unfair to ask the developing nations to bear the brunt of the responsibility. The responsibility lies with the greatest polluters, the US, the EU and China. However, I think it is necessary that developing countries do not develop in the same way that we have. To that extent, I think it is necessary to provide them the alternative energy generation technology that the West has. This is not about sinking a lump sum of money to developing countries and let them sort it out, instead about sharing knowledge to produce food and energy sustainably. Which is far more valuable.

[center] OH GOD IT'S GLOBAL WARMING! RUN! [/size]
[/center]

In 50-100 more years seashell collections will be very valuable.

This is a pretty interesting book
http://www.worldwithoutus.com/did_you_know.html

Volcanoes spew out some pretty nasty elements but we are still here.

Black widow spiders are highly venomous but we are still here.

(Am I doing this right?)

Yes, that is the technique Darth Dan was taught.

When he went to school :smug:

Well Im sorry my parents were not rich enough to send me to Harvard or Cambridge like you, and I take it that by your sarcasm that I was poorly educated. And let me ask you a question. Are you a professional in Climatology or anything close to that science? and the "smug" expression that you noted defines your attitude very well.

Allow me to direct you to your earlier post:

That's right. The one, wherein, you claimed to have learned "science" at what was possibly an institute of "higher learning."

Around the year 1500, Paracelsus said "Alle Ding' sind Gift, und nichts ohn' Gift; allein die Dosis macht, daß ein Ding kein Gift ist." It's an idea that's quite well understood by most people who have learned "science" and as such none of those people would be in this thread, right now, today, suggesting that we shouldn't be worried about pollution because some poorly-defined list of other things are possibly more poisonous to you in a twisted sort of ceteris paribus reasoning that assumes there are no natural processes that compensate for any other natural processes.

Someone is on the war path again.

...what?

This is what the world should place more emphasis upon, and its getting out hand

http://ngm.nationalgeographic.com/2008/01/high-tech-trash/carroll-text

The biggest polluters are cows. We need to eat more of them so they stop farting!

Also. ****ing environmentalists got us into this stink. We'd have replaced all our coal power plants with clean and safe nuclear plants by now if they weren't all tardy.

I guess jon'c should start to collect sea shells instead of gold.

And he comes back with a withering but irrelevant retort after only 8 hours!

I wasnt on this thread 8 hours ago and I killed alot of vornskrs in mots.

Another new development...


http://motherjones.com/blue-marble/2009/12/breaking-proof-copenhagen-elaborate-sham


Apparently, the UN never even had the goal of getting Carbon emissions down to the level they stated they said they were trying to.