[Hippy]

I still think we need spaceships.

[jr2]

Pfft.  I don't think the issue here was if Global Warming was happening or not.  I think the issue here was whether it was man-caused, or significantly affected by man. 

I think it's a cycle, warmer and colder about every 50 years) but that it's getting warmer from the last Ice Age.

[Kazan]

Pfft.  I don't think the issue here was if Global Warming was happening or not.  I think the issue here was whether it was man-caused, or significantly affected by man. 

explain the increase in atmospheric carbon load

[Mefustae]

I think it's a cycle, warmer and colder about every 50 years) but that it's getting warmer from the last Ice Age.

Oh, I didn't know you were an accredited climatologist. Praytell, from which university did you get your doctorate?

[Hippy]

'Global Warming' is a physics theory, specifically an outgrowth of thermodynamics. Think thermodynamic modeling on a planetary scale - if there's a net increase in energy in the system then 'warming' is said to have occurred. If there is a reduction in the amount of energy in the system then 'cooling' has occurred. Global warming or cooling to a sufficient extent could potentially result in global climatic change to the extent it interferes with human activities).

You can't call it a 'hoax', or 'bunk', unless you want to tangle with Sir Newton laws of thermodynamics. Or unless you use a definition of global warming that is divorced from physics.

Man-made global warming is the issue of whether humans are adding enough energy to the global system to result in 'warming'. This is debatable.


Which just proves my argument that we need more spaceships. I'm not quite sure how but it does, just accept it.

[jr2]

I think it's a cycle, warmer and colder about every 50 years) but that it's getting warmer from the last Ice Age.

Oh, I didn't know you were an accredited climatologist. Praytell, from which university did you get your doctorate?

The same one where you got yours.

[redsniper]

I am fully in favor of more and bigger spaceships.

[Kazan]

Man-made global warming is the issue of whether humans are adding enough energy to the global system to result in 'warming'. This is debatable.

we're added green house gases, which allow the atmosphere to retain more energy

I think it's a cycle, warmer and colder about every 50 years) but that it's getting warmer from the last Ice Age.

Oh, I didn't know you were an accredited climatologist. Praytell, from which university did you get your doctorate?

The same one where you got yours.

he's not the one disagreeing with the top scientists in the field

Substantiate your claims that it's "Bunk" with evidence and forward an alternative theory explaining the facts or admit that you're wrong

Your position: political
Their Position: scientific

[jr2]

Your position: political
Their Position: scientific

I take issue with your claim that all scientists in all the related fields support Glow-Bell Warning.  In fact, if that was the case, we wouldn't be having this discussion.

[Ford Prefect]

Yes, just like if evolution were credible we wouldn't be having that discussion.

[jr2]

Yes, just like if evolution were credible we wouldn't be having that discussion.

Ah.. he gets it.

[Mefustae]

I take issue with your claim that all scientists in all the related fields support Glow-Bell Warning.  In fact, if that was the case, we wouldn't be having this discussion.

If total consensus was required in any scientific endeavor, civilization would have been technologically stunted centuries ago. The mere fact that a statistically significant number of scientists firmly believes this to be an issue should be enough to demonstrate a need to give the theory the benefit of the doubt.

The fact of the matter is that too many people - such as yourself - like to give completely unqualified and uninformed opinions as if they meant something, bogging down the issue with meaningless tripe. That is why we're having this discussion.

[BloodEagle]

*snip*

If total consensus was required in any scientific endeavor, civilization would have been technologically stunted centuries ago. The mere fact that a statistically significant number of scientists firmly believes this to be an issue should be enough to demonstrate a need to give the theory the benefit of the doubt.

*snip*

Correct me if I'm wrong, but, weren't a great deal of those scientists saying that the Earth was in danger of another ice age a few decades back? 

[Mefustae]

Correct me if I'm wrong, but, weren't a great deal of those scientists saying that the Earth was in danger of another ice age a few decades back? 

It's one of the favourite quotes of anti Global-Warming advocates that 20 years ago the scientists were saying we were on the edge of an Ice Age. A lot of people don't realise that, geologically speaking, we still are. No scientist ever gave a date, in fact, the closest approximation was 'within 20,000 years', it was the Media that blew it up into 'Any minute now....'. Evidence strongly suggests that each end of an interglacial period actually began with temperatures rising before dropping into a glacial stage.

Look it up, if you'd like.

What does it matter, anyway? What kind of idiot would discount a large portion of the modern scientific community just because some scientists may have been wrong 20 years ago?

[BloodEagle]

*snip*

*snip*

Look it up, if you'd like.

Anyway. A few years ago scientists also said CFCs were creating a hold in the ozone layer. They were correct. We listened to them and we managed to slow the process to nearly a halt. Imagine if people had just ignored the scientific community on the basis that, at one time, they were wrong. **** evidence! **** logic! You were wrong at one point, and we shall never listen to your kind again! Damn the consequences!

I was merely trying to point out that their track record seems questionable. In which case, calling someone else's opinion wrong because they aren't these same scientists seems a tad silly.

Of course, I have been wrong before....

Imagine if people had just ignored the scientific community [or anyone] on the basis that, at one time, they were wrong.

[Ford Prefect]

I was merely trying to point out that their track record seems questionable. In which case, calling someone else's opinion wrong because they aren't these same scientists seems a tad silly.

Their job is to study the nuances of the way the physical world behaves, not to get you a Happy Meal. Just because they aren't always right doesn't mean their views aren't worth astronomically more than every rhetorical masturbator who decides to contribute their equivalent of "THIS IS WUT I THINK ABOUT GLBOAL WAMRING LOL". Stephen Hawking was apparently wrong about the black hole information paradox. Guess we shouldn't ask that jackoff about black holes anymore.

[Hippy]

Man-made global warming is the issue of whether humans are adding enough energy to the global system to result in 'warming'. This is debatable.

we're added green house gases, which allow the atmosphere to retain more energy

Of course we have and are. But is it enough to result in drastic global climate change to an extent that our lives will be directly impacted? I think it is but I'm no expert so I'm happy to be wrong.

However, the economic-impact argument against cutting/altering high-polluting industry to reduce GW effects (i.e. it would cost too much and adversly effect the ecomony) is largely bunk in my view - cost of doing so if GW/CC false = medium,  cost of doing so is true = low. Cost of doing nothing if false = negligible, cost of doing nothing if true = extremely high.

The conservative, risk minimisation, least impact approach leads to the doing something option just in case. Being a risk averse is worth it in this particular case.

Spaceships however, are a perfectly acceptable alternative - let's use the last of Earth's resources to colonise the solar system and that way when this wonderful blue planet of ours finally turns glowing toxic green we'll all have a fantastic view of it out the earth-side windows of our comfy space-homes while downing a Bosch Beer or ten.

[Fearless Leader]

I still think we need spaceships.

global warming = bunk

so now you know more than the best scientists in the fields of meteorology and climatology?

please, explain to us your theory explaining the global temperature increase (Which is undeniably fact - we have stinking observation records going back more than 100 years) and accounting for variables such as the 50% increase in atmospheric carbon load since the industrial revolution.

you also need to account for why the atmosphere is retaining 6x10^21 Joules more energy

how old is the plant? and we only have 100 years of records.


Ok, did anybody take into account that the earth's magnetic field is in the process of flipping its poles (north will be south)? of course its going to be warmer. Of course its going to have more energy, as the amount of radiation being absorbed by the atmosphere increases .

Fearless Leader is awesome in bed

I know, thank you.

[karajorma]

You mean the pole flip that started over 1000 years ago?

Correct me if I'm wrong, but, weren't a great deal of those scientists saying that the Earth was in danger of another ice age a few decades back? 

Weren't a great deal of the scientists who say global warming is real but not man made saying that global warming wasn't real at all a few decades back?

[jr2]

You mean back when the other ones were whining about global cooling?  Nah.  Don't think so.