In Poland the UN is having a conference on climate change. They are of course stating that there is no doubt that global warming is real and they are trying to outline a plan to fix it.
http://www.livescience.com/environment/ ... reaty.html

Meanwhile we have 650 scientists who don't believe in global warming and think its a fraud and are speaking out against it.

http://tinyurl.com/5laabm

Is this damn debate ever going to be solved or are we just going to spend the rest of our lives debating whether or not it's getting warmer and if we can or should do anything about it. I personally have no idea because I'm not a scientist, but this is getting ridiculous. I propose a scientist battle royale, and whoever has the last surviving scientists on either side of the debate wins.

Here is a better question. Why don't we reduce air pollution not because global warming is bad but because it improves the health of people in the cities?

Acid rain
Respiratory problems
ground water contamination

Shouldn't these reasons be enough to reduce emissions?

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I'm with Zeph. I don't really think global warming is as bad as many believe, but we do cause a lot of pollution that's obviously bad and we should work on reducing it.

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Of course global warming is real. Al Gore made a movie about it.

650 represents a tiny minority of scientists working in climate-related fields. Even then, speaking out is meaningless unless there is compelling evidence to support the point.

The fact that the planet is warming on average is incontrovertible. Any real disagreement is about precisely why, what will happen, and what, if anything, should be done. At present, the weight of evidence suggests that humans are responsible for most of the recent heating, that average temperatures will continue to increase (with geographic variation), that this will cause various unpleasant effects, and that reducing concentrations of greenhouse gases is the most direct counter (including massive scrubbing of the atmosphere if much further heating is to be avoided).

For perspective, the north pole is looking like it will be ice-free in a few summers, and there is about 35% more carbon dioxide in the atmosphere since the Industrial Revolution began.

On the matter of uncertainty, some people making statements to the contrary doesn't undo the presence of basic knowledge about the situation, or the agreement of the great majority of professionals in the field. Unfortunately, you have to do the research to see that those things are there before dismissing the claims of uncertainty.

I believe the world is getting warmer, and the degree the world's temperature is rising is affected partly by human activity, but not as much as people say. What I don't believe is that we can do anything about it. There is absolutelly no way anyone can stop global warming. Lowering carbon emisions? Even completely stoping man made carbon emisions won't stop global warming, much less reverse it. Scientists, politicians, and people in general should be spending money, time, and effort trying to adapt to whatever happens.

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"An honest man is one who knows that he can't consume more than he has produced"
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http://tinyurl.com/5laabm Wow that's just awesome. And "Global Warming" has been an issue in like 8 different forms for like 50 years. When I was a kid it was "Green House Effect" that was the scary shit everyone was worried about. Then when that died out because people are idiots now it's Global Warming. Weird how the earth got hotter and colder thousands of years before humans invented cars.

really fucking weird.

Yeah I'm with Froggy it's getting warmer, deal with it. And I'm with Zeph and Layne reduce emissions anyways. Air quality matters.

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Planetary scale engineering is rapidly approaching practicality. That's how all those greenhouse gases got there in the first place. Removing a trillion tons of carbon dioxide from the atmosphere would pretty much stop the warming, just like that. It's just that a direct geoengineering effort on that scale would probably be much more expensive than cutting emissions and riding out moderate climate changes.

I'm going to agree with everyone except Val...

First I don't think humans put out more CO2 than all the volcanoes around the world so at absolute max it's half us and half the planet. Compounded with the natural ups and downs I'm even further removed from the idea that humans are the cause.

Second the global warming (and the global cooling our children will be bitching about in 20-40 years hopefully) even if partially caused by us can not be reversed by us. No amount of emission cutting will cause a noticeable negative in the total amount of CO2 or temperature. They planet will go as it goes from this point.

Lastly I'm fully supportive of cutting emissions for our well being. Don't get me wrong I'm not going to trade the convenience of my car to ride around on a moped nor will I stop every 2 hours in my trip to recharge the fucking battery of my car. However advancements in the technology should be continued with all haste and once they produce viable results they should be advocated.

I can't decide whether this was meant to be ironic or not.

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How many times am I going to hear this?

From the Telegraph:



Other things from this year:

China battles coldest winter in 100 years
Record snowfalls in Europe and North America
First snow in Baghdad in 100 years (from January 2008)

From the Center for Global Food Issues:



"Incontrovertible?"



The scientific data points toward changes in CO2 occurring after temperature changes, not the other way around. With that said...why would removing a trillion tons of carbon dioxide 'stop' the warming (which is currently not happening)?

Heck, why WOULD you want to remove that much carbon dioxide? You'd think that there'd be an adverse effect on the plant life that actually absorbs CO2 in exchange for oxygen, wouldn't you?

Also, for those curious, an interesting slide-show about the placement of temperature stations throughout the US. Hope you like getting data near hot tarmac!

Oh, and one final note, there's a little thing about thickening Antarctic ice to consider.

Now...to conclude:

1) What are the total effects of man on the climate compared to, say, the Sun? Or various other patterns? After all, the Ice Age ended long before SUVs came around.

2) What are the costs of reducing emissions? What are the benefits? What economically feasible ways are there?

3) Nuclear power. Full-tilt. One of the cleanest modes of energy around when considering how much energy it provides; the only issue is disposal afterwards, and that's a relatively simple matter to attend to.

But please, don't pretend that the matter is 'settled'.

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Quote of the Moment

Damnit Redley. You're too damn effecient.

But yes, also Alaskan Glaciers just grew for the first time in 250 years, Glaciers in Norway have started growing, and Arctic Sea Ice rebounded to 1980's levels.

And for the basic theory itself... Let me ask a few questions of my own.

1) Will global Warming produce more clouds, or less clouds?
   A: Nobody knows. Higher temperature=higher solubility=less clouds, but then higher temperature=more evaporation=more clouds. Huh.   

2) One of the claims made to support Global Warming is that more tropical diseases will occur. How many new tropical disease have come out over the last 20 years?
   A: None. Funny.   

3) Proponents have said that thousands of species are threatened. What are the majority of those?[spoiler]A: Insects. Insects that mot biologists will tell you are redundant in nature, anyways.[spoiler]

More to come, possibly, but I'm going to bed.

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Well, I think even if Global Warming isn't real (And seeing as there is no second Earth-like planet for comparison, making the theory untestable, I find it rather silly to assert whether it is real or not as if it's an absolute...) it could theoretically be a good motivating factor for making nations stop polluting in more immediately dangerous ways, such as potentially poisoning water sources, or squandering natural resources. I dislike the money making apparatus that has been structured around it, however, and I've always wondered if that wasn't the real motivating factor for the theory's advocates.

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FUKKATSU

It's difficult to hold a conversation if the basic facts are in dispute. Do you disagree with NASA's findings?



It's important to understand the difference between weather and climate. Weather can do anything, including record snows and cold, but that doesn't mean the climate isn't getting warmer and dryer in that one spot. The relationship between local weather and global climate is even more tenuous. None of the things you mention here affect the global energy balance.


Only if you stick to the relevant facts, i.e. measurements of global temperature.


That's a reference to historical temperature changes. Carbon dioxide would indeed increase in concentration as things like solar activity drive temperature changes. However, carbon dioxide is still a greenhouse gas, and amplifies solar and other forcings. Now, the issue is that there is too much carbon dioxide in the atmosphere, so the Earth is warming even in the absence of other forcings.



Removing that much carbon dioxide would return atmospheric carbon dioxide concentrations to about pre-industrial levels, lowering the thermal equilibrium point which is currently warmer than present. Plants grew just fine then, and the increasing carbon dioxide implies that the plants are already using as much as they are going to.


Volcanic activity puts about 150-250 million tons of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere per year. Human activity puts about 30 billion tons of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere per year, meaning 120-200 times volcanism. Also, despite seasonal cycles, the concentration of carbon dioxide in rising, in a manner that nicely matches human activity. What do you mean by "natural ups and downs"?


Models predict that, if all human greenhouse emissions stop now, the world will continue to warm for over a thousand years. Like I mentioned before, humans have put a large chunk of that carbon dioxide there. Stopping emissions would make a large (read: double-digit percentage) difference over time compared to business as usual. Also, the task of removing enough carbon dioxide to counter the warming is a task on the same order of magnitude as current human activity.

Edit: On further review, it seems that the world will continue to warm for over a thousand years if all emissions stop, not a century as I originally wrote.


Those are ALL the temperature stations (and all areas covered by other measurements, like satellites)? A lot of the world is paved, and should be measured when investigating global temperature. This shows that developed areas are being measured, not that the rest of the world isn't.


Again, weather vs. climate. Basically, warmer temperatures means more water vapor in the air, which means more precipitation. Antarctica is still cold enough for snow, so it gets more snow. Keep in mind that Antarctica has some of the driest deserts on Earth. More snow is not necessarily a return to the status quo.


1) See the radiative forcing chart.

2) That's beyond the scope of my argument, except for an estimate that reducing emissions and weathering small changes would be cheaper than directly removing enough carbon dioxide to stop global warming.

3) Agreed, but what does that have to do with the matter at hand?





Nope. Observation: the planet is warming. Hypothesis: human-produced greenhouse gases are driving the change. Test: gather a bunch of data about temperature, gas concentrations, and anything else that would plausibly influence the temperature. Run everything through the best computer model you can put together, run it forward and backwards in time, and compare its results to historical measurements. Conclusion: the hypothesis is either correct or incorrect. Theory: make a framework that puts everything together.


Science never, ever deals in absolutes. No scientist should have asserted it as such. Do you have a link to such an assertion?


Except that without regulations that specifically cover those things, industry would be tempted to relax standards in other things while reducing greenhouse gas emissions, in order to reduce cost.


You mean like research grants and tax incentives for "green" technology and development, as opposed to the fossil fuel industries? The evidence should stand on its own in any case, and the planet is getting warmer.

Hey, since we're all so hung up on CO2, and that less CO2 is good, and that (If we go by Val's sources and statements) even if we stop right now the world gets warmer, how do we solve this?

So, the assumptions go like this:
- Less CO2 is good.
- Humans stopped expending CO2 right now.
- The world is still getting warmer for quite some time after.
- Still too much CO2 in the atmosphere.

So, internet, how do we solve this?

I'm thinking a giant vacuum that sucks up all the CO2 and shoots it into the sun.

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I actually do have some issues with NASA, in the sense that I have to take a second look when they release data now (if, for no other reason, because of the fact they still have James Hansen DESPITE the controversies that have risen due to his data methodology). Take a read on this for a brief background on that particular idea (especially regarding the infamous 'hockey stick' graph by Mann, which was accepted by the IPCC despite how terribly faulty it was).

For example, when crap like this occurs, I start having a habit of doubting the data.



So yeah.

Here's an idea: when you see such an area of science that has become so heavily politicized that you have scientists willing to fudge data for the sake of funding or political gain, it'd be wise to adopt the mindset of "who ya gonna believe, them or your own eyes?" Like with politicians whenever they talk.

To start out with that, here's a nifty little tool, courtesy of the University of Illinois Department of Atmospheric Sciences. Lets you look satellite views of the Arctic Sea.

Just for starters, I set the initial comparison between December 11 of both 1998 and 2008.



Because it involves dealing with environmentalists who say no to anything that is actually feasible, economic or otherwise, to change our current energy structure. Which ties into the whole climate change debate.

After all, it's hard to advance when you have a bunch of feel-goodism environmentalists suing you for DARING to try and construct a nuclear power plant. Or clearing away old deadwood from forests (which kind of helps prevent forest fires from becoming humongous). Etcetera.

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Quote of the Moment

Skipping the applicability of those objections to the measured temperature increase at hand, what about similar information from the University of East Anglia and this composite?

Then, what about the National Academy of Sciences, the IPCC, and a more recent study by Mann indicating that, while the initial "hockey stick" graph wasn't quite right, it was pretty close?

Given these and the previous information, do you concede that the observed facts indicate that the Earth is warming?


An unfortunate but quite obvious error. The moral being that studies are scrutinized and problems corrected, or at least identified. There doesn't seem to be such a problem with the NASA picture I posted before, and the information is corroborated by additional, apparently good sources. To me, in the absence of contradictory evidence, that particular information from NASA is good beyond reasonable doubt.


The thing is that human senses are insufficient in time, space, and accuracy to matter in this case. The only way to measure global climate change is with a global network of sensors. Since the scientists run the sensors, it's a case of "who you gonna believe, them or your blind eyes?" Though they run the sensors, their data and methods are made public for scrutiny.


Nifty indeed, but should be taken with a grain of salt. For one, snow cover isn't shown before 2004. For another, you looked at the extent of (mostly thin) winter ice, which reforms annually when sea water gets cold enough. The increase in average temperature there has only been a couple degrees, not enough to prevent ice from forming in the winter, but enough to cause a large reduction in the thick year-round ice. Have a look at the ice extents in August to compare this, since that's usually when the minimum extent is. Also, not only has the persistent ice shrunk in extent, it has gotten much thinner, which is not shown in that information.


But

So I would think that this is tangental at best.

Don't want to sound like a smart-ass, but does anyone even know what the fuck they're actually talking about?

Also, from what I've heard, there has been a steady increase in temperature over the years, with a huge drop in temperature after a while (about fifty years), in a steady interval. This means that global warming is inevitable. However, after the industrial revolution, this balance has shifted, and the temperature has increased more rapidly, also from what I've heard.

Theory is, there will always be a global warming, followed by an immediate fall in temperature. But, with additional emission, this balance can get disturbed.

I mean, would anyone think back then cutting down a rainforest can eliminate a lot of species? I think not, but right now we can't argue that mankind is responsible for the extinction of several species. While this doesn't prove anything, we can't just simply shut our eyes and / or deny the possibility that we can also contribute to the global warming, much more than nature by itself does? Should we really deny the possibility that we can fuck up the environment just because it hasn't been proven?

I mean, seriously, should we? Or should we just take it as a possibility and actually prevent any possibility from ever happening, or at least minimizing the damage we might inflict?

It's not about whether or not global warming is real. It's about whether we take the risk by continuing what we're doing, or playing it safe by at least lowering this risk.

We can't exclude any risk, sometimes we have to take the chances we have, but with the environment, we're currently not taking chances, we're just exploiting our chances.

Also, sooner or later our natural resources will be working against us. Do you really believe we have an infinite amount of oil under our feet?

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Yes, actually, although the production of it is quite slow.

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I see this argument all the time: "Even if the globe isn't warming, should'nt we rather be safe than sorry?"

"Even DDT isn't a carcinogen, shouldn't we rather be safe than sorry?"

"Even if high-voltage wires don't cause cancer, shouldn't we rather be safe than sorry?"

"Even if Breast Implants are perfectly safe, shouldn't we rather be safe than sorry?"

"Even if the wolves/deer/elk aren't about to go extinct, shouldn't we rather be safe than sorry?"

The answer is no. We should be right. We need to know what the problem is, or even if there is a problem. Let's look at just a few of these. We'll start with the breast implants.


About ten years ago, someone made claims that silicon breast implants caused cacer and autoimmune diseases. High-profile news shows, political hearings, etc. Despite specific statistical evidence that this wasn't so, the maunufacturer was hounded out of business after paying nearly $4 Billion dollars. Within four years, this was completely and thouroughly debunked.


On to High-Voltage power lines.

Everyone remember/know about that? Someone claimed that High-voltage powerlines caused cancer. Nary a scientific study to it, but it caught on in the public mind. It was in The New Yorker. Eventually, the truth came out, and guess what? We ended up spending $25 Billion dollars on a phony scientific theory.

As a bit of comparison, that could have completely wiped out the two still persistent forms of the polio virus, Supported 34 million people in good health for a year, given HIV/AIDS medication to nearly every infected individual in Africa, etc. That is more than the combined GDP of the 50 poorest nations of the world combined.
Instead, we piss it away on a fantasy.

Finally, DDT.
DDT-A horrible Carcinogen, an imminent threat to human life, and destroyer of the environment. False, False, and mostly False. And at the time it was banned, everybody knew it.

It is not a carcinogen, or toxic to humans, or dangerous to any forms of life except American Raptors. It IS a good thing we banned it for domestic agricultural use. But we decided to ban it globally, making sure that any government that used it would get no aid from us or our allies. And this "better safe than sorry" idea killed more people than Hitler.

Wait, go back and read that again. Yes, that's right. Banning DDT killed more people than Hitler. How? Malaria, primarily in sub-Saharan Africa. Before it was banned, less than 50,000 deaths yearly were due to Malaria. Since then? Over two-point-three million a year. And that's the conservative estimates.

A new WHO study puts the total number dead as a result of banning DDT at somewhere around fourty million people. Fourty Million. But hey, we need to be safe, right?


How much you care is irrelevant, what you care about is irrelevant, desire to do good is irrelevant. The only things that matter with cases like these are Knowledge and Results.

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Vanny, Al Gore set you up the bomb. You have no chance to win make your time.

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(Inspired by Twilight Princess)

Okay, let me put it in this perspective.

Long before the Industrial Revolution nature has had the capability of recuperating from any shift in the climate. In fact, it is theorized that the surplus of oxygen caused at least one ice age.

After a while the climate became stable. Sure, there were a lot of forest fires, so that less CO2 could be taken in by the trees, but the effects would be negated by several factors, including the fact that trees could easily regrow on burnt woods.

However, after the Industrial Revolution, mankind kept wanting to expand. We kept cutting down more trees, keeping less and less plants to take up CO2. Now, normally this would be okay. If we would plant beets, since they basically are tripping CO2. But we don't replace the trees with beets. Sure we've got laws to replace the trees with something CO2 consuming, but mostly illegal cutters won't. So we will have to do with less plants.

So, unless we miraculously can grow grass on the Sahara desert, we will keep on getting less CO2 converted into O2. No big deal, right? Well, that's where there's another factor. We still make more CO2 than what was normally the case. You can't deny that fact. There will still be a large blanket over our heads called CO2.

Now, that still wouldn't be a big problem, right? I mean, people don't radiate that much warmth, and eventually, if global warming is true, this CO2 blanket would be so thick sunlight wouldn't be able to warm the Earth, right?

Right. And that's the entire gist of it. Either way, we're fucked.

But let's say we're not fucked. Surely if or when it will be proven that Global Warming is a fact, we can do anything about it, right? Well, sad fact is, Global Warming is not our only problem.

You see, unlike what people believe, there is no infinite amount of oil under our feet. We would love to have an infinite amount of black gold, but oil doesn't grow on trees, now does it? Well, technically, it does, but still. There is no infinite amount of oil underneath our feet. Now we don't know how much oil is left, but it's still enough for probably a whole century, hopefully longer, because right now we need all the time we've got.

You see, a lot of things around us use oil. The black gooey stuff, not that stuff you bake your egg in. Now, we could try to find efficient was to ride around on baking oil, but we don't, simply because it's silly, right? Well, how about these hybrid cars? Well, from what I've heard people keep saying they don't make that much a difference. Well, sure they don't. On short term.

You see, these hybrid cars aren't really there to lower the output of CO2 in the short run, perhaps not even in the longer run. However, they are a jumping board for cars that don't rely on oil. How ideal is that? Never to go to a gas station again! Grandiose! You see, that's also the positive side of looking at Global Warming issues.

I mean, without war, would we ever be able to play video games? I think not, simulations were created just to plan war, and from there, it evolved to video games. Or computers, even. I mean, what would you be like if the Yanks didn't decide to shoot some Nazis?

So, why don't we also look at the positive side to "battling" Global Warming. I mean, we seemed to love going to war to retrieve some imaginary weapons of mass destruction back in the Middle East, so why not go to war against the imaginary threat called Global Warming? I mean, we've got electric cars, perhaps electric planes. We've already got electric trains, and some people working on an ornithopter, making it a less consuming helicopter. Oh, and having an oil-less energy generator could give us the possibility to take us to the moon, and beyond.

So, let's just battle this imaginary Global Warming. At least discussing alternate ways of making energy does make some progress. And, as an added advantage, with more oil, we can go much longer. You know, since most power generators still rely on oil.

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RetroCheaters: Cheating the hard way...
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Casmiricus: Perhaps, but in response to you I'd suggest looking at my first argument. Simply put if the causes of what would be considered man made global warming are decreased there will be a similar decrease in the problems I alluded too.

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Zepherin for forum queen and writer of the best seller "how to screw your brethen up for dummies". ~ The Mirak

Temperature from the very graphs you have posted show that as of 2004 we were just reaching the temperatures from the pre-industrial revolution period which you keep bantering about. There is still no reason to think that the temperature has risen as a result of higher CO2 concentrations nor that the temperature has risen abnormally.

But back to the matter of blame game, I found only one blog which supported your 30 billion so I present a counter theory. http://wiki.answers.com/Q/How_much_gree ... ted_yearly



History predicts that it's going to cool back down in at most 100 years time. Now which will you trust more a potentially biased model by scientists with an agenda or history? Even throwing out human intentions which will you trust more technology which at it's peak still can't predict the weather with certainty or history which is well established in repetition?






But really popular theory for global warming is tiresome. CO2 is a heavier than air gas and thus the highest concentrations of it should be in the lower atmosphere on the average. Still aside from a few cities known for smog you don't hear anything of the sort. You don't hear anything about the CO2 displacing lighter gases like oxygen into higher elevations and all of the CO2 concentration samples are coming out of ice instead of the always present air we breathe. Oh that's right it's forming a blanket as a green house gas somewhere in the upper atmosphere. How this make sense god does not know.

And of course all the scientists pay little regard to the effects and potentials of an increase in raising the water vapor concentrations. Those hydrogen cars that only emit the stuff are still up as an alternative fuel source are they not? Trading one cause of a problem for another cause of the same problem would be a smart thing to do durp.

First in reference to Zeph/Sentios: Cutting pollution is a good thing. It is a fantastic thing. The problem is that so many of the methods used to combat global warming decrease emission of CO2, but INCREASE other pollutants. Hybrid cars and their production put huge amounts of nickel, cadmium, and other heavy metals concentrated into the biosphere. Ethanol? Puts more Nitrous Oxides, literally toxic to humans and te environment, into the atmosphere than normal octane fuel.

Also, termites emit more methane, and have acombined mass many times that of humanity or its chemical productions.

On to gary:
Wrong. First of all, the Sahara is CONTRACTING. It has been for the past six years. I'll get you the relevant references on Monday.

Second of all, there is more old growth forest in North America than there was when Colombus landed.

As for your forest fires releasing CO2-Guess what? Forest fires are ESSENTIAL for forest health. California's Great Redwoods? The largest trees in the world? Guess what-They cannot reproduce without the heat of low-level forest fires. Forest fires have immensely recuperative effects for forests.

Then there's the well documented fact that CO2 stimulates plant growth. More CO2--> More Plants.

What's more, the largest carbon sink isn't the plants. It's the ocean. CO2 reacts with H20--> CO3(2-)--->HC03--->CaCO3 which then snks into the ocean. This is after the oceans spent the entire paleosctine emitting CO2 into the atmosphere to keep some semblance of a balance.

Moving on from that, the time period with the highest concentrations of CO2 was an Ice Age! Not the previous ice age, but the one before that. The one 200,000 years ago.

Moving on to your "CO2 Blanket...." Let me put this in perspective for you. We're standing on the football field that is the Earth's Atmosphere. For those not from the U.S., a football field is 100 yards/metres long. Nitrogen is by far the most prevalent gas out there-It carries us close to 75 yards. Oxygen makes up most of the rest, and carries us until we are 1 yard from the goal line. Inert gases, like Argon and Neon, Methane, and Water Vapor take us all the way to the chalk stripe. Other minor gasses carry us even further.

The amount of CO2 in the atmosphere? One inch. The amount we have added? The width of a pencil. CO2 fumes are not going to block out the sun. Not outside of an L Ron Hubbard story, at any rate.

And since you want to look at the good side of fighting global warming, why don't we look at the bad side. Ethanol, which has led to the greatest deforestation increase in the Amazon in close to twenty years. Let's talk about how many of the technologies being used to fight global warming concentrate actual pollutants and heavy metals to dangerous levels, especially in developing nations. Let's talk about the people in the developing world who can be lifted out of poverty and perhaps bring their countries into the modern century, but can't because people who think like you do won't let them build cheap, effective coal powerplants.

The fight against global warming, the unsavory, unhappy, non "Earth-Mother" type stuff represents a neo-colonialism towards indigenous people, and a new "White Man's Burden" toward the developing world.

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