An interesting subject, don't you think? Feel free to turn this thread into a flamewar, I'm just interested in getting an idea of what people believe.

EDIT: If human effects are significant, even if other effects might be involved, please choose option 1 or 2. I didn't mean to leave out the possibility that there is more than one cause.

Isn't the current scientific consensus that the climate is indeed changing, we are affecting it, but not on such a massive scale as Al Gore or such say?

I'm not entirely educated on the subject, but from what I understand, there is a globe, and it is warming.

Define global warming please.

Is the poll meant to exclude the option that it is caused by both us and natural processi?

Ah, no, I guess I just forgot that. I suppose if you think human effects are significant (even though other effects may be in play), then go for one of the "caused by humans" replies.

Aww, should've been a public poll.

think Im going to plead the 5th on this one.

Does the INTERNET have a constitution?

These two statements are true:

Humans do things that make things heat up. (Increase the surface area of the earth with buildings, create things that put off power...etc.)
The earth's climate changes on it's own.

so "Global Warming" is whatever the ef you want it to be.

All I know is I hate heat. I want to live in Antartica. If it melts I'll blame terrorists.

"Global warming" refers to warming effects which are inconsistent with normal climate patterns, and which climatologists attribute to human production of greenhouse gases.

does that apply these forums!?

global climate change might be a better name to use...seeing the climate are more extreme then they used to (colder and hotter)

IDK IT WAS PRETTY COLD THIS WINTER!

Its happening.

In my pants.:hist101:

In all seriousness, we had a rather cold summer up here this year with only a handful of days at or above seasonal average. On the other hand, this winter is particularly mild this year and there's been less precipitation than the past 3 years.

When you listen to the media around here, its hard to believe in global warming. "Hottest winter since 1949!", **** like that makes it sound like its just a cycle.

I think the climate change is a normal process, but I could reasonably assume that we have made our impression upon it.

The Earth has gone hot to cold many times over before we got here.

I think that we don't really know. We suspect that we're contributing (strongly), but we can't be sure in what ways. Is it carbon? I've read (Superfreakonomics) that a huge contributor may be water vapour, but nobody's simulations allow for it yet...

EDIT:

I've given a reason for it happening, but haven't stated that I do believe it is happening. WHICH I DO.

Indeed. The poll appears to leave out what's probably the most probable option. I voted for "happening, caused by humans, and is something we need to worry about in the short term." simply because it's the closest option to reality, as kyle90 suggested. Those of you that don't know the difference between "climate" & "weather" shouldn't even be allowed to vote. You're simply showing, once again, how imbeciles like George W. Bush got elected. They call it "global warming" because it happens on a "global" scale, not necessarily a "local" scale. Please read a little on the subject before voting. For those of you that don't believe it's happening at all, you're probably also putting your fingers in your ears & saying "I can't hear you" every ****ing time you think you'll hear something that's contrary to your preconceived notions. Even most of the skeptics believe that the Earth is warming, they simply don't believe that man is the major culprit (from what I can tell, most of them believe it's caused by solar variation).

Yay! New angsty argument thread in the making! GO!

The climatologist that that portion of Superfreakanomics mostly cites has actually publicly denounced the book for misquoting and misrepresenting him. It's not really a good source for GW info. Or, possibly, other kinds of info, given the precedent.

http://climateprogress.org/2009/10/12/superfreakonomics-errors-levitt-caldeira-myhrvold/

Processi is not the plural of process, stop trying to sound smart.

Global warming my ***, it snowed here last week. SNOWED.

Yeah yeah I know, it was a joke

Commas don't join two independent clauses together. Stop using comma splices and sounding dumb.

Yeah; use a semicolon.

Actually they do, but they are supposed to be joined by conjunctions.

Hmmm. I was unware that 'stop' was a conjunction these days, Emon.

This thread is slowly getting better. Fight! Fight!

It's not. I know my sentence was incorrect, I was just correcting your assertion. That's why I said, "but they are supposed to be joined."

I never made an incorrect assertion in the first place for you to correct, unless you deliberately choose to interpret my statement in a way that allows for you to prolong the bickering.

The way you interpreted my statement is akin to saying that it only takes half of something to do something that in reality requires the whole of it.

Needs more blood.

Climate science is so imperfect and the uncertainty margins are so huge that for anybody to claim to be able to make any predictions for the decades to come is simply moronic. Here's a $5,000,000 grant and a wink wink, please use it to establish a "scientifically legitimate reasonable worst case scenario".

Do the doomsday global warming studies that are being spoon fed to use fit within the propagated uncertainties of the data that was input to the model that was created, as well as the uncertainties inherent to the model? I'm sure they probably do, therefore, what's being fed to us is technically "legitimate science". Does it tell the whole story? No, because when was the last time you saw a genuine and complete scientific report on the subject (Al Gore moaning in heat in front of pictures of glaciers that are smaller than they were 20 years ago doesn't count). We the people cannot trust the "end of the world" data being fed to us, and spin up any sort of climate prediction and I would bet my life that it could be made to fit within SOME SORT of uncertainty margin for some study based on some model that any scientist could reasonably create.

We just don't know, and we don't have enough data (We've only been able to take a scientifically reliable air temperature for what, like the last century or two if that? Doesn't really matter, its an insignificant amount of time) and the data we have isn't accurate to construct any sort of reliable model. This earth has been going through the motions for BILLIONS OF YEARS! BILLIONS! Nobody human can even comprehend how long that is! Especially compared to the amount of reliable data we have at our disposable.

However we can glean data from stuff such as ice core samples, which do indeed point to rising CO2. I'm more in the middle here, it's obvious that the climate is changing, with all the crap we're doing it's also obvious that it must have some effect. How much is nature, how much is us, and how far it will go is unknown to me at this point.

Wait, what? You said, "Commas don't join two independent clauses together." That's incorrect. Perhaps you meant it applied to my sentence, but I didn't see a clear indication of such. Whatever.

Hey, can you cite any of this from peer-reviewed studies? Rush Limbaugh doesn't count.

Here are some interesting articles that everyone should read.

• Climate uncertainties and the problems communicating them
• Five things you should know about climate change
• Why a cold winter doesn't mean climate change is behind us

I would also advise those of you that are skeptical, which is perfectly fine, to research the scientists that are opposed to the concept of global warming (e.g. who funds their research, what they actually do believe, etc.).

It's not incorrect. Commas don't join two independent clauses together; a comma and a conjunction do. You're trying to claim that I need only one part to join two independent clauses, a comma, and that's incorrect.

I think Venus has us whipped on global warming. Those bastards...

List of things to never argue with Freelancer about: grammar

Oh yay, shall read later. TOO DRUNK NOW.

I read it (under the influence) and it doesn't talk about water vapour; it talks about how they're wrong about their rejection of carbon. Which is a different issue. BLEH.