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+--Forum: After the Bar Closes...
+---Topic: The Global Warming Thread started by Dr.GH


Posted by: Dr.GH on April 15 2011,16:21

< http://stonesnbones.blogspot.com/2011....ng.html >

I thought that it would be fun to have a contest on how many errors of fact are in Ms. Butt's load.

The format I thought up is in three parts; a "bidding" phase where we can put up the number, 4, 5, 6, etc... The second phase will be the highest bidder listing the errors they see, and the third will be a "wild card" prize if anyone can add extra errors in addition to the high bidder. The First Place winner gets the traditional bottle of single malt Scotch. The Wild Card should be a box of chocolate full of anti-oxidants.
Posted by: paragwinn on April 15 2011,18:21

Is Ms. Butt hurt by your suggestion?
Posted by: Henry J on April 15 2011,23:11

It's not worth the cost of having to read the stuff! ;)

Henry
Posted by: khan on April 16 2011,18:09

To quote Mother: "Crazier than an outhouse rat."
Posted by: Kristine on April 16 2011,19:55

So, we are to vote, right? I'll just hazard a guess without enduring the drivel: 10.

First of all, our butt is an important muscle, helping us to stand erect.

There's one.  :p
Posted by: Dr.GH on April 17 2011,13:58

Well, since Kristine is the only entry, she will probably win by defalt.

Now for phase two, list all ten errors. (I only noted 9, but just listening to her made me dizzy).

 :D

PS: You cannot shimmy without a butt.


Posted by: Kristine on April 17 2011,14:51

Quote (Dr.GH @ April 17 2011,13:58)
Well, since Kristine is the only entry, she will probably win by defalt.

Now for phase two, list all ten errors. (I only noted 9, but just listening to her made me dizzy).

 :D

PS: You cannot shimmy without a butt.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------


True enough!

Ugh. I have to wade through this drivel again (I did finally listen to it).

1. From the look of her hair, she never gave up AquaNet. But she was only using it to stop runs in her nylons, not to control that weathered bird's nest that she calls her hairstyle.
2. Global warming is not caused by CFCs, but apparently holes in the head are (hence the ratted comb-over).
3. She was told "not to eat chocolate" by her gym teacher, not her science teacher.
4. She was told "not to eat chocolate" by her prom date, not her science teacher.
5. She was told "not to eat chocolate" by her mirror, not her science teacher.
6. She never went to science class. She was always sitting in the Principal's Office for sneaking chocolate in Political Science class (an anti-social behavior that apparently continues to this day).
7. She never stopped eating milk chocolate (she just gave up having milk duds in her pockets), and she never started eating dark chocolate (because it doesn't taste as good to her).
8. She never mentions that the Taliban likes to use Prell shampoo. (This is a fact! )
9. That outfit. All wrong! :D
10. She does not acknowledge that evolution gave us a butt which allows her to stand upright even after eating all of that chocolate.

P.S. I should have said that there are at least 10 errors. She is rather like Ann Coulter who in her book Godless committed multiple errors in each sentence necessitating a veritable matrix of corrective annotations.
Posted by: Henry J on April 17 2011,18:21



---------------------QUOTE-------------------
First of all, our butt is an important muscle, helping us to stand erect.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------


That's getting to the bottom of things.
Posted by: Kristine on April 17 2011,18:47

Can I have both the scotch and the chocolates? ;)
Posted by: k.e.. on April 18 2011,02:40

Quote (Henry J @ April 18 2011,02:21)


---------------------QUOTE-------------------
First of all, our butt is an important muscle, helping us to stand erect.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------


That's getting to the bottom of things.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------


He's fighting a rear action.
Posted by: noncarborundum on April 18 2011,21:44

Quote (k.e.. @ April 18 2011,02:40)
Quote (Henry J @ April 18 2011,02:21)
 

---------------------QUOTE-------------------
First of all, our butt is an important muscle, helping us to stand erect.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------


That's getting to the bottom of things.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------


He's fighting a rear action.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------


Having gotten a little behind in his work.
Posted by: paragwinn on April 18 2011,22:57

Quote (noncarborundum @ April 18 2011,21:44)
Quote (k.e.. @ April 18 2011,02:40)
 
Quote (Henry J @ April 18 2011,02:21)
   

---------------------QUOTE-------------------
First of all, our butt is an important muscle, helping us to stand erect.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------


That's getting to the bottom of things.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------


He's fighting a rear action.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------


Having gotten a little behind in his work.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------


Too busy playing "Truth or Derriere"
Posted by: noncarborundum on April 19 2011,00:21

Quote (paragwinn @ April 18 2011,22:57)
Quote (noncarborundum @ April 18 2011,21:44)
 
Quote (k.e.. @ April 18 2011,02:40)
   
Quote (Henry J @ April 18 2011,02:21)
     

---------------------QUOTE-------------------
First of all, our butt is an important muscle, helping us to stand erect.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------


That's getting to the bottom of things.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------


He's fighting a rear action.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------


Having gotten a little behind in his work.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------


Too busy playing "Truth or Derriere"
---------------------QUOTE-------------------


I'm a little surprised how long it tuchus to get this going.
Posted by: k.e.. on April 19 2011,02:06

Quote (noncarborundum @ April 19 2011,08:21)
Quote (paragwinn @ April 18 2011,22:57)
 
Quote (noncarborundum @ April 18 2011,21:44)
   
Quote (k.e.. @ April 18 2011,02:40)
     
Quote (Henry J @ April 18 2011,02:21)
     

---------------------QUOTE-------------------
First of all, our butt is an important muscle, helping us to stand erect.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------


That's getting to the bottom of things.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------


He's fighting a rear action.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------


Having gotten a little behind in his work.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------


Too busy playing "Truth or Derriere"
---------------------QUOTE-------------------


I'm a little surprised how long it tuchus to get this going.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------


Nothing assinine from Louis yet
Posted by: Amadan on April 19 2011,05:16

Quote (k.e.. @ April 19 2011,08:06)
Quote (noncarborundum @ April 19 2011,08:21)
Quote (paragwinn @ April 18 2011,22:57)
 
Quote (noncarborundum @ April 18 2011,21:44)
   
Quote (k.e.. @ April 18 2011,02:40)
     
Quote (Henry J @ April 18 2011,02:21)
       

---------------------QUOTE-------------------
First of all, our butt is an important muscle, helping us to stand erect.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------


That's getting to the bottom of things.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------


He's fighting a rear action.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------


Having gotten a little behind in his work.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------


Too busy playing "Truth or Derriere"
---------------------QUOTE-------------------


I'm a little surprised how long it tuchus to get this going.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------


Nothing assinine from Louis yet
---------------------QUOTE-------------------


I have to say, I'm glute to the screen waiting for the next pun.
Posted by: Louis on April 19 2011,05:19

Quote (k.e.. @ April 19 2011,08:06)
Quote (noncarborundum @ April 19 2011,08:21)
Quote (paragwinn @ April 18 2011,22:57)
 
Quote (noncarborundum @ April 18 2011,21:44)
   
Quote (k.e.. @ April 18 2011,02:40)
     
Quote (Henry J @ April 18 2011,02:21)
       

---------------------QUOTE-------------------
First of all, our butt is an important muscle, helping us to stand erect.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------


That's getting to the bottom of things.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------


He's fighting a rear action.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------


Having gotten a little behind in his work.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------


Too busy playing "Truth or Derriere"
---------------------QUOTE-------------------


I'm a little surprised how long it tuchus to get this going.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------


Nothing assinine from Louis yet
---------------------QUOTE-------------------


Arse-k me nicely and I assure you I shall buttle along with something fundamental for you.

Louis
Posted by: k.e.. on April 19 2011,05:34

Quote (Louis @ April 19 2011,13:19)
Quote (k.e.. @ April 19 2011,08:06)
Quote (noncarborundum @ April 19 2011,08:21)
 
Quote (paragwinn @ April 18 2011,22:57)
   
Quote (noncarborundum @ April 18 2011,21:44)
     
Quote (k.e.. @ April 18 2011,02:40)
       
Quote (Henry J @ April 18 2011,02:21)
       

---------------------QUOTE-------------------
First of all, our butt is an important muscle, helping us to stand erect.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------


That's getting to the bottom of things.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------


He's fighting a rear action.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------


Having gotten a little behind in his work.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------


Too busy playing "Truth or Derriere"
---------------------QUOTE-------------------


I'm a little surprised how long it tuchus to get this going.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------


Nothing assinine from Louis yet
---------------------QUOTE-------------------


Arse-k me nicely and I assure you I shall buttle along with something fundamental for you.

Louis
---------------------QUOTE-------------------


Now you're bending over backwards soon you'll be the posterior of the joke.
Posted by: Louis on April 19 2011,06:05

Quote (k.e.. @ April 19 2011,11:34)
   
Quote (Louis @ April 19 2011,13:19)
   
Quote (k.e.. @ April 19 2011,08:06)
     
Quote (noncarborundum @ April 19 2011,08:21)
     
Quote (paragwinn @ April 18 2011,22:57)
       
Quote (noncarborundum @ April 18 2011,21:44)
         
Quote (k.e.. @ April 18 2011,02:40)
           
Quote (Henry J @ April 18 2011,02:21)
             

---------------------QUOTE-------------------
First of all, our butt is an important muscle, helping us to stand erect.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------


That's getting to the bottom of things.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------


He's fighting a rear action.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------


Having gotten a little behind in his work.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------


Too busy playing "Truth or Derriere"
---------------------QUOTE-------------------


I'm a little surprised how long it tuchus to get this going.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------


Nothing assinine from Louis yet
---------------------QUOTE-------------------


Arse-k me nicely and I assure you I shall buttle along with something fundamental for you.

Louis
---------------------QUOTE-------------------


Now you're bending over backwards soon you'll be the posterior of the joke.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------


This was a series of polite puns until you rectum. What an


Louis
Posted by: k.e.. on April 19 2011,06:41

Quote (Louis @ April 19 2011,14:05)
Quote (k.e.. @ April 19 2011,11:34)
   
Quote (Louis @ April 19 2011,13:19)
     
Quote (k.e.. @ April 19 2011,08:06)
     
Quote (noncarborundum @ April 19 2011,08:21)
       
Quote (paragwinn @ April 18 2011,22:57)
         
Quote (noncarborundum @ April 18 2011,21:44)
           
Quote (k.e.. @ April 18 2011,02:40)
             
Quote (Henry J @ April 18 2011,02:21)
             

---------------------QUOTE-------------------
First of all, our butt is an important muscle, helping us to stand erect.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------


That's getting to the bottom of things.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------


He's fighting a rear action.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------


Having gotten a little behind in his work.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------


Too busy playing "Truth or Derriere"
---------------------QUOTE-------------------


I'm a little surprised how long it tuchus to get this going.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------


Nothing assinine from Louis yet
---------------------QUOTE-------------------


Arse-k me nicely and I assure you I shall buttle along with something fundamental for you.

Louis
---------------------QUOTE-------------------


Now you're bending over backwards soon you'll be the posterior of the joke.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------


This was a series of polite puns until you rectum. What an


Louis
---------------------QUOTE-------------------


Um yeah crapulous. The trout rises for the fly. Punishing.
No browneye points and only two more puns for your turd. Butter wait for the last tango in Tennessee.
Posted by: noncarborundum on April 19 2011,08:16

Quote (k.e.. @ April 19 2011,06:41)
 
Quote (Louis @ April 19 2011,14:05)
   
Quote (k.e.. @ April 19 2011,11:34)
       
Quote (Louis @ April 19 2011,13:19)
         
Quote (k.e.. @ April 19 2011,08:06)
         
Quote (noncarborundum @ April 19 2011,08:21)
           
Quote (paragwinn @ April 18 2011,22:57)
             
Quote (noncarborundum @ April 18 2011,21:44)
               
Quote (k.e.. @ April 18 2011,02:40)
                 
Quote (Henry J @ April 18 2011,02:21)
                 

---------------------QUOTE-------------------
First of all, our butt is an important muscle, helping us to stand erect.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------


That's getting to the bottom of things.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------


He's fighting a rear action.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------


Having gotten a little behind in his work.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------


Too busy playing "Truth or Derriere"
---------------------QUOTE-------------------


I'm a little surprised how long it tuchus to get this going.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------


Nothing assinine from Louis yet
---------------------QUOTE-------------------


Arse-k me nicely and I assure you I shall buttle along with something fundamental for you.

Louis
---------------------QUOTE-------------------


Now you're bending over backwards soon you'll be the posterior of the joke.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------


This was a series of polite puns until you rectum. What an


Louis
---------------------QUOTE-------------------


Um yeah crapulous. The trout rises for the fly. Punishing.
No browneye points and only two more puns for your turd. Butter wait for the last tango in Tennessee.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------


The cheek of some people . . . .
Posted by: k.e.. on April 19 2011,09:01

Speaking of opera to paraphrase the the great WC Fields the deniers such as rep. Butthole

Sound like a monsoon whistling up an Aardvarks asshole
Posted by: Kristine on April 19 2011,12:59

*Drinking teh scotch* Bottoms up! :)
Posted by: Robin on April 19 2011,13:02

Quote (noncarborundum @ April 19 2011,08:16)

---------------------QUOTE-------------------




---------------------QUOTE-------------------
Quote (k.e.. @ April 19 2011,06:41)
   
Quote (Louis @ April 19 2011,14:05)
   
Quote (k.e.. @ April 19 2011,11:34)
         
Quote (Louis @ April 19 2011,13:19)
         
Quote (k.e.. @ April 19 2011,08:06)
           
Quote (noncarborundum @ April 19 2011,08:21)
           
Quote (paragwinn @ April 18 2011,22:57)
             
Quote (noncarborundum @ April 18 2011,21:44)
               
Quote (k.e.. @ April 18 2011,02:40)
                 
Quote (Henry J @ April 18 2011,02:21)
                   

---------------------QUOTE-------------------
First of all, our butt is an important muscle, helping us to stand erect.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------


That's getting to the bottom of things.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------


He's fighting a rear action.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------


Having gotten a little behind in his work.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------


Too busy playing "Truth or Derriere"
---------------------QUOTE-------------------


I'm a little surprised how long it tuchus to get this going.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------


Nothing assinine from Louis yet
---------------------QUOTE-------------------


Arse-k me nicely and I assure you I shall buttle along with something fundamental for you.

Louis
---------------------QUOTE-------------------


Now you're bending over backwards soon you'll be the posterior of the joke.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------


This was a series of polite puns until you rectum. What an


Louis
---------------------QUOTE-------------------


Um yeah crapulous. The trout rises for the fly. Punishing.
No browneye points and only two more puns for your turd. Butter wait for the last tango in Tennessee.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------


The cheek of some people . . . .


---------------------QUOTE-------------------



Feh...what a bunch of bums*...you should all be thrown out on your fannies**


* English usage of the term

** Definitely AMERICAN usage of the term
Posted by: Dr.GH on April 20 2011,11:10

What I had hoped for was a bit more like:

Lies, and gross errors of fact:

Transcript from < Think Progress >, "At the risk of drawing this out, which I hate to do(1), but I do know, as Rep. Dunn has mentioned, that I was taught things in science class in high school which have turned out not to be true.(14) I remember so many of us when we were seniors in high school, we gave up Aqua Net hairspray. You remember why we did that? Because it was causing global warming(2 a,b,c)! That aerosol in those cans(3) was causing global warming(4). Since then, scientists have said(5) maybe we shouldn’t have given up that aerosol can because that aerosol was actually absorbing(6) the earth’s rays(7) and keeping us from global warming(8).

So, so many things we learned in science class(14) have turned out not to be true.

What about eating chocolate? You know, I was told, don’t eat chocolate(9). Good dark chocolate is full of what? Anti-oxidants!(10) Some chocolate is good for you. So many things that we learned in science class.(14, and she flunked English too).

What this bill does is protects a teacher(11) — not mandates what a teacher teaches — it protects a teacher when a child asks a critical thought question about something like global warming or evolution(12). They have the right to ask that question, and the teacher has the right to not make them feel stupid for asking(13)!"

(1) She does not mind drawing things out at all,
(2 a, b, c) a, She was apparently a HS senior in the late 1960s (we are the same age); global warming was not yet considered an issue, the only possible issue was ozone depletion. b, Ozone depletion was not an issue in the late 1960s. c, CFCs used as propellants are weak greenhouse gases and had negligible effect on global warming.
(3) There is no aerosol in the cans, the aerosol is produced in the can’s nozzle.  
(4) The hairspray contents, polyurethane, acetone, and CFCs, of the cans didn’t contribute directly to warming.  
(5) “Scientists” have not said anything she has mentioned, or is about to mention.
(6) The hairspray aerosol (misted plastic) sprayed on girl’s hair does not absorb global warming “rays.”
(7) The Earth does not have global warming “rays.”
(8) Neither the hair spray components, nor the generated aerosol contribute to cooling. There are aerosols, like clouds, that do. Clouds are not like hairspray.
(9) I doubt this woman was told not to eat chocolate in science class because she seems to have never attended a science class.
(10) “Although a bar of chocolate exhibits strong antioxidant activity, the health benefits are still controversial because of the saturated fats present,” *1
(11) Teachers are already protected, and expected to teach “critical” thinking, and what is a “critical thought problem?” (Two alternating hypothesis left Philadelphia …).
(12) The bill is to teach creationism, and the bitch knows it.
(13) Teachers don’t need to be “protected” from “not making a child feel stupid.” A pattern of making a child “feel stupid” is abuse.
(14) Ms. Butt learned nothing in science class. Nothing a teacher could do would have prevented Ms. Butt form being stupid, regardless of how she feels about it. She does not seem to realize she is stupid, but she isn’t in school anymore (worse the luck).

*1 “Cocoa Has More Phenolic Phytochemicals and a Higher Antioxidant Capacity than Teas and Red Wine.” J. Agric. Food Chem., 2003, 51 (25), pp 7292–7295


Posted by: Kristine on April 20 2011,11:12

But...

:)
;)
:D
Posted by: Dr.GH on April 20 2011,11:23

Quote (Kristine @ April 20 2011,09:12)
But...

:)
;)
:D
---------------------QUOTE-------------------


You still win the chocolate.

PM your address.

:D
Posted by: Robin on April 20 2011,11:51

[quote=Dr.GH,April 20 2011,11:10][/quote]


---------------------QUOTE-------------------
(9) I doubt this woman was told not to eat chocolate in science class because she seems to have never attended a science class.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------



Were there not warnings against chocolate consumption, originating in the 60s or 70s, concerning its contribution to acne and tooth decay? I seem to recall such myths being promoted, but I don't remember the source for those claims.

---
ETA: Oooo...bad Anglash! Bad! No more double negatives!
Posted by: Dr.GH on April 20 2011,12:01

Quote (Robin @ April 20 2011,09:51)
[quote=Dr.GH,April 20 2011,11:10][/quote]
 

---------------------QUOTE-------------------
(9) I doubt this woman was told not to eat chocolate in science class because she seems to have never attended a science class.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------



Were there not warnings against chocolate consumption, originating in the 60s or 70s, concerning its contribution to acne and tooth decay? I seem to recall such myths being promoted, but I don't remember the source for those claims.

---
ETA: Oooo...bad Anglash! Bad! No more double negatives!
---------------------QUOTE-------------------


My memory is a bit clouded by age, but I seem to recall that it was said that chocolate candy was unhealthy- mostly milk chocolates with more fats and sugar than chocolate.
Posted by: Steviepinhead on April 20 2011,14:53

Fortunately, your memory is not clouded by hairspray!
Posted by: Dr.GH on April 20 2011,16:35

Quote (Steviepinhead @ April 20 2011,12:53)
Fortunately, your memory is not clouded by hairspray!
---------------------QUOTE-------------------


I think I'll cloud it with scotch.
Posted by: Dr.GH on April 20 2011,18:21

I should have titled this "A Load of Crap from Republican Sheila Butt (R-Columbia)"
Posted by: Henry J on April 20 2011,22:44



---------------------QUOTE-------------------
So, so many things we learned in science class(14) have turned out not to be true.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------


Same here. I learned that the periodic table had 103 entries (last time I checked it had 118). I learned that everything alive was either a plant or an animal (never mind that bacteria, protists, and fungi aren't in either of those groups). I learned that the solar system had nine planets. I learned that protons and neutrons were fundamental particles. (How will I recover from unlearning all of that?)

Henry
Posted by: Dr.GH on April 21 2011,08:54

Quote (Henry J @ April 20 2011,20:44)


---------------------QUOTE-------------------
So, so many things we learned in science class(14) have turned out not to be true.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------


Same here. I learned that the periodic table had 103 entries (last time I checked it had 118). I learned that everything alive was either a plant or an animal (never mind that bacteria, protists, and fungi aren't in either of those groups). I learned that the solar system had nine planets. I learned that protons and neutrons were fundamental particles. (How will I recover from unlearning all of that?)

Henry
---------------------QUOTE-------------------


I thought that I was old!
Posted by: Dr.GH on April 21 2011,08:57

Well, we seem to have won this skirmish.

< Tennessee's "monkey bill" on hold >
Posted by: Dale_Husband on July 01 2011,22:32

Yikes! I made my request for a thread on this forum dedicated to global warming a couple of nights ago and wasn't even aware of THIS! My apologies!
Posted by: Kristine on July 02 2011,01:00

Quote (Dale_Husband @ July 01 2011,22:32)
Yikes! I made my request for a thread on this forum dedicated to global warming a couple of nights ago and wasn't even aware of THIS! My apologies!
---------------------QUOTE-------------------


Yeah, Dale Husband, what a buttinsky! ;)
Posted by: Wesley R. Elsberry on July 02 2011,08:39

Topic creation got a bit out of hand for a while. I'm trying to generalize topics as the need arises, thus this one goes from being only about one politician's cluelessness on global warming to a general thread with some notice of the one politician.
Posted by: Schroedinger's Dog on July 02 2011,08:47

Quote (Wesley R. Elsberry @ July 02 2011,14:39)
Topic creation got a bit out of hand for a while. I'm trying to generalize topics as the need arises, thus this one goes from being only about one politician's cluelessness on global warming to a general thread with some notice of the one politician.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------


Hi Wes.

I think this might go to board mechanics, but is there any way to have a birthday threads aggregator somewhere? Would avoid new topics when original one is weirdly named...

Also, I know these threads don't seem relevant, but they always put a smile on one's face, which is relevant.
Posted by: Dale_Husband on July 02 2011,22:09

Quote (Wesley R. Elsberry @ July 02 2011,08:39)
Topic creation got a bit out of hand for a while. I'm trying to generalize topics as the need arises, thus this one goes from being only about one politician's cluelessness on global warming to a general thread with some notice of the one politician.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------


Good, now maybe you could move all the posts on the Bathroom Wall this past week referring to global warming to here too?
Posted by: Dale_Husband on July 02 2011,22:41

Or maybe this will do:

 
Quote (Robin @ June 28 2011,12:11)
 
Quote (Dale_Husband @ June 28 2011,11:51)
I have a request. Can there be a thread somewhere  that we can debate the connections, if any, between anti-evolutionism and global warming denialism? I see such a connection but I'd like to know what others think.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------



I'd be all for it, mostly because I don't get global warming denial and would love to read a succinct explanation for the argument and mindset.

Near as I can tell though, it appears the same style of "logic" is used in each groups' arguments. They may well be made up of the same people for all I know, but if so I can't figure out why.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------



Quote (OgreMkV @ June 28 2011,12:26)

I personally think that global warming denial is exactly like creationism.

There is a small group of 'leaders' (Fred Singer is one) who knows that they are spreading lies, but have a good reason for doing so (related to finances).

Then there are the 'unwashed masses' who believe them for whatever reason: Republicans who have full trust in what their GOP leaders say, people who hate any form of government intrusion, industry workers who view it as a threat to their jobs, etc.

These guys are in full thrall to the leaders who know they are peddling lies.  Just like the denzions of UD are in thrall of Dembski, Behe, and Meyer who are smart enough to know better.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------



Quote (fnxtr @ June 28 2011,21:50)

One of the authors of "Merchants of Doubt", whose name escapes me, was on Mothercorp (CBC) this morning. She pointed out that many of the climate change deniers are the same people who were previously ozone-hole deniers, tobacco->cancer deniers, and so on. Not just the same "fog up the science window" tactics, the very same people.  I was waiting for her to add evolution-deniers to the list, but maybe it's in the book.

---------------------QUOTE-------------------



Quote (sledgehammer @ June 29 2011,00:27)

Seems to me that the common theme here is science denial:
"It's those know-it-all, arrogant scientists trying to tell us what's what. They are the source of all our problems, and the reason the world is going to Hell on a Harley. Life was so much simpler when we were all ignorant and easily manipulated by those in power, and it's so much more comforting to be sheep, and place our trust in the anointed shepherds."
---------------------QUOTE-------------------



Quote (Erasmus @ FCD, June 29 2011,01:49)

i propose a clear demarcation standard (it might prove insufficient, yet)

ahem.  

"hoax", "fraud", "IPCC are godless homocommies", "Algoremanbearpig is fat and flies huge planes around between his empty climate controlled manbearpigcaves", "didn't you hear they made it all up" or "Climategate" is grounds for dismissal and hurling of insults with preening nerd justificationisms


how does that sound?  muuuah
---------------------QUOTE-------------------



Quote (Badger3k @ June 29 2011,08:46)


Most of those who are in the Denier camp seem to advocate that humans are not doing anything that can affect the environment and cause any warming.  That is the most common usage of the term, since to most people "global warming" = "anthropogenic global warming".  Thus your first choice would be a Denier, while the other two are more in the "accept that AGW is real, and we're trying to figure out how to respond to it".  

At least, that's the way I see it.  Could be wrong, tho'.

---------------------QUOTE-------------------



Quote (OgreMkV @ June 29 2011,09:31)

I agree with this.  No sane person disagrees that the Earth is getting warmer.  The ten hottest years on record have all occurred in the last 13 years.

When 'global warming' is bandied about, it is most commonly meant to be 'human-caused global warming'.  Which, strangely is not up for debate either, by any climate scientist that I'm aware of (Singer doesn't count).

As far as the rest, if human activity is causing global warming, then we have two choices

1) Stop causing it
2) Continue causing it and live with the consequences

Much too much to get into right now though.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------



Quote (Robin @ June 29 2011,09:35)



Quote (Trubble @ June 29 2011,00:19)
Mind if I ask for a definition of terms here?
---------------------QUOTE-------------------



Have at it!

 

---------------------QUOTE-------------------
What exactly constitutes a global warming denier?
---------------------QUOTE-------------------



An excellent question! Let's see what our options are:

 

---------------------QUOTE-------------------
Are you a denier if you agree global warming is occurring, but that various natural causes are more to blame than human activity?
---------------------QUOTE-------------------



Mmm...probably not.

 

---------------------QUOTE-------------------
How about if you agree global warming is real, but that the impact in future will be less catastrophic than suggested by some? Is that denial?
---------------------QUOTE-------------------



I'd say no.

 

---------------------QUOTE-------------------
How about if you agree global warming is occurring, and human activity is the main driver, but reversing it is impractical and we'd be better off finding ways to adapt?
---------------------QUOTE-------------------



Ummm...still no.

 

---------------------QUOTE-------------------
And before any of you zealots...
---------------------QUOTE-------------------



Yep, THAT would be it!

 

---------------------QUOTE-------------------
...jump on me, I'm not advocating any of those positions. I just find it strange that such a sharp demarcation is drawn on an area of research that is really still in its early stages.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------



See...this kind of defensiveness is a real clue that you have an agenda. People without agendas merely ask, "what's a global warming denier?" and then discuss the concept. By immediately distancing yourself from the issue ('no really...I don't have a dog in this fight!!!') and at the same time calling use "zealots", you've tipped your hand.

The demarcation is easy - anyone who denies the reality of the data suggesting that the planet is warming and the contribution to said warming by human activity is a pretty straight forward demarcation. Oh...and the area of research isn't in the early stages; it's been going on for quite some time.

Tsk tsk...
---------------------QUOTE-------------------



Quote (Tracy P. Hamilton @ June 29 2011,12:08)



 
Quote (Trubble @ June 29 2011,00:19)
Mind if I ask for a definition of terms here? What exactly constitutes a global warming denier?

Are you a denier if you agree global warming is occurring, but that various natural causes are more to blame than human activity?
---------------------QUOTE-------------------



Yes.

 

---------------------QUOTE-------------------
How about if you agree global warming is real, but that the impact in future will be less catastrophic than suggested by some? Is that denial?
---------------------QUOTE-------------------



It depends on the specifics.  Mealy mouthed claims of "less catastrophic" Yes.

Some things are quite clear, such as sea level rise, melting of arctic sea ice, increased extremes in recipitation / drought. If someone will acknowledge that these will increase but not be catastrophic I would like to see them tell the victims that the effects were not catastrophes, just mild inconveniences.

 

---------------------QUOTE-------------------
How about if you agree global warming is occurring, and human activity is the main driver, but reversing it is impractical and we'd be better off finding ways to adapt?
---------------------QUOTE-------------------



No.  

 

---------------------QUOTE-------------------
And before any of you zealots jump on me, I'm not advocating any of those positions. I just find it strange that such a sharp demarcation is drawn on an area of research that is really still in its early stages.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------



---------------------QUOTE-------------------



Quote (midwifetoad @ June 29 2011,12:34)

I agree that warming is happening, that humans are a primary cause, and that it could be unpleasant and expensive to protect (or abandon) coastal cities.

I simply think the only way to mitigate or reverse the trend is to move toward nuclear power, preferably thorium, which produces no byproducts with military applications, and which is well understood, and has been for 50 years.

I am sad that the people who are concerned with warming are mostly opposed to the only viable solution.

I think fusion energy is a fantasy, maybe centuries away.

Solar and wind have so many undesirable side costs that I think they will never compete with nuclear.

Nuclear can be used to produce alcohol and hydrogen, which are the only fuels likely to replace gasoline.

---------------------QUOTE-------------------



Quote (Kristine @ June 29 2011,12:57)

While we're on the subject of global warming denial:
 
Quote (kevinmillerxi @ June 23 2011,15:31)
Two new docs for you guys to check out:

< http://www.facebook.com/pages/SpOILed-The-Movie/216288371729865 >

< http://www.facebook.com/sexandmoneyfilm >
---------------------QUOTE-------------------



"SpOILed" is just another "drill-baby-drill" tome. "This film will change the way you think!" We can't drill here or there, while China laughs at us, etc. Same old crap. I used to be a film critic before I entered grad school, and am not easily fooled by naifs.

I have not been able to find out much about "Sex and Money," so I cannot say anything about it, but Kevin's films have really been tanking on iMDb, including "After..." which was the one effort of his which did intrigue me.
 

---------------------QUOTE-------------------
Kevin has written, co-written, and edited over 40 books, both fiction and non-fiction.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------


"Both fiction and nonfiction." :)

ETA - "We need your prayers and YOUR MONEY < to fund 'Doctor Dino' >." :D Hey Walt Ruloff! Why didn't you help these poor people out?

---------------------QUOTE-------------------



Quote (Henry J @ June 29 2011,13:28)

I deny that my globe is any warmer than anything else in my living room!

---------------------QUOTE-------------------



Quote (OgreMkV @ June 29 2011,13:35)

Nuclear is dead.  Whether or not is a viable technical solution, it is economically and socially dead tech.

1) It is not economic.  I have compared the various techs and nuclear is about half the cost of solar and ten percent more expensive than wind power.  

For the same price as a new (current technology, no future tech) nuclear plant, a utility can build an equivalent capacity (not name plate, but actual production capacity) of wind power AND a multi-megawatt storage system for base load production.

Plus, the wind farm can be completely on-line in less than a year.  The nuclear plant will not even begin production once construction has started for between 6-16 years.  

The cost of nuclear based electricity has remained the same over the last 30 years, while the cost of wind and solar have dropped considerably.

2) Solar and Wind with storage can provide baseload power, so that's a non-issue.  Spain has several molten salt solar thermal plants.  The most current is only 20MW, but can also provide power for 15 hours with zero sunlight.

You don't mention 'so many undesirable side costs', but I've been studying this subject for 2-3 years now and I haven't found any 'undesirable side costs'.

3) Any electricity source can be used to make hydrogen.  But hydrogen is not the only thing that could conceivably replace gasoline.  Top of the line (still expensive) pure electric vehicles can currently achieve 300 miles per charge (at highway speeds).*  There are electric semi-trucks that can pull standard trailers for in-town delivery purposes.  If you eliminate cross-country trucks, then fossil fuel vehicles would no longer be needed.


Like, I said, I've been looking at this for years.  If it's a choice between nuclear and fossil.  Then I'm all for nuclear.

If you throw renewables (wind and solar) into the choices, then forget nuclear and go for wind and solar.


*Personally speaking, I haven't driven more than 250 miles in one day in over 7 years.  If you skip one driving vacation, then I haven't driven over 250 miles in over 17 years).

---------------------QUOTE-------------------



Quote (Glen Davidson @ June 29 2011,15:07)


Quote (midwifetoad @ June 29 2011,12:34)

  I simply think the only way to mitigate or reverse the trend is to move toward nuclear power, preferably thorium, which produces no byproducts with military applications, and which is well understood, and has been for 50 years.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------



Not so.  The US has made and exploded a U-233 bomb.  Its critical mass is somewhat greater than plutonium, much less than U-235.

Nevertheless, due to radiation issues, making U-233 weapons is considered to be difficult, and thus the thorium cycle by itself is likely to impede proliferation.  

Of course there are other issues, like the fact that fairly highly enriched uranium (although far less than weapon-grade, something like 25% enriched) would be needed to begin the fuel cycle, and, due to relatively poor U-233 breeding, enriched uranium would necessarily continue to be input, at least in any reactors made thus far.  So the whole uranium issue isn't exactly gone, but perhaps would be manageable (weapons grade U-235  or plutonium never needing to be involved, at least).

Since transuranic elements would be little made, the thorium cycle itself would create only fairly short-lived isotopes (order of centuries at most), although the uranium inputs would continue to produce some of the longer-lived transuranics--unless very highly enriched uranium were in fact used (actually, via U-236 even HEU would produce some transuranics, but relatively little).  Still, less of the long-term radiation poisons would result.

I can't detail why, but it's thought that thorium reactors would operate more inherently safely than, say, pressurized uranium reactors (which can be quite safe, IMO).  So there's another plus.

There are worthwhile advantages to thorium--especially the quantity available--and so it's probably worth pursuing. I just wonder why it gets such glowing press.  Worst of all in that respect is that people will say that thorium was ignored because it doesn't produce plutonium, when in fact lightwater reactors are not very good producers of it either--one of the reasons why they are pushed in this world.  True, reprocessing can yield useful plutonium, but it's still expensive, and the yield isn't nearly as good as natural uranium reactors using graphite or heavy water as moderators (the Soviets did use power reactors to breed plutonium, in fact, one reason Chernobyl was unsafe and used graphite as moderator).

   

---------------------QUOTE-------------------
I am sad that the people who are concerned with warming are mostly opposed to the only viable solution.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------



It's far from perfect, but yes, nuclear actually works, and could help transitionally.  I'd rather it not be the long-term "solution" for power production.

   

---------------------QUOTE-------------------
Solar and wind have so many undesirable side costs that I think they will never compete with nuclear.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------



Never?  Why not?  Thin-film solar might someday be fairly cheap (nothing is known to prevent this), and storage might come down as well.  Wind will never be cheap compared to non-capture coal, but should be useful as a supplement--not a bad price when warming is factored in, yet it's limited and incapable of reasonable baseload generation.

But it's very annoying to get the hand-waving "costs are coming down" when nuclear vs. solar is being discussed.  Who cares?  Costs have always been coming down, and they're still high even without the heavy added cost of storage, which isn't even slightly realistic at present.  

No one who says solar is competitive explains how it is.  They don't bother with our pathetic level of detail, because, well, the details aren't friendly to such claims.

   

---------------------QUOTE-------------------
Nuclear can be used to produce alcohol and hydrogen, which are the only fuels likely to replace gasoline.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------



Yes, but we're still far from that being affordable.  Interestingly, though, nuclear using electrolysis at high temperatures (which nukes can provide quite readily) boosts efficiency clear up to 50%, from 30%.  50% isn't anything very impressive either, however.

Glen Davidson

---------------------QUOTE-------------------



Quote (Dale_Husband @ June 30 2011,00:59)

I've always been opposed to nuclear power. It's too damned expensive, and too dangerous! People have died because of it! How many people have been killed by wind farms or solar panels? None that I know of! Sure, some birds may be killed by wind farms. Cats also kill birds, but you don't consider that reason to never have them around, do you?

If we could have nearly the entire Sahara Desert covered by wind farms and solar panel stations, Africa would probably be freed from depending on any other energy source. And that must scare the fossil fuel companies $#itless!

---------------------QUOTE-------------------



Quote (Dale_Husband @ June 30 2011,01:04)

Robin, my admiration for you just shot up 100 points! Bravo!


---------------------QUOTE-------------------



Quote (Trubble @ June 30 2011,15:55)

 
Quote (Robin @ June 29 2011,09:35)
See...this kind of defensiveness is a real clue that you have an agenda. People without agendas merely ask, "what's a global warming denier?" and then discuss the concept. By immediately distancing yourself from the issue ('no really...I don't have a dog in this fight!!!') and at the same time calling use "zealots", you've tipped your hand.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------



Great. That's the very reaction I wanted to preempt. My fault, I probably should have approached the counter with more care, like George placing his order with the Soup Nazi.*

I used "you zealots" as a tongue-in-cheek reference to the kind of person who would immediately see my questions as masking some kind of anti-science agenda. In retrospect, perhaps a bad choice of words, but I didn't actually think people here would be that sensitive.

My "agenda" was to try to elaborate the denier label. It seems to be thrown around pretty carelessly at times, so I was curious where people here draw the line. I gave specific examples in order to get specific answers, instead of generalities. Several people provided thoughtful answers. To them, thanks.

My own view is that global warming is real, is serious, and is at least largely caused by human activity. But I also think drastic action is impractical right now, so we should be looking at what is realistically doable. I know some would label that view as "denial", which is why I asked.

Also for the record, I've been coming to this site almost daily for about five years, mainly for the funny and to keep up with the creationism issue, which I find fascinating. I just don't make posts, because I don't have any particular expertise in science, just a layman's interest and an undergrad anthro degree.

   

---------------------QUOTE-------------------
Oh...and the area of research isn't in the early stages; it's been going on for quite some time.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------



Well, I guess it's all relative. If you're sitting in a doctor's waiting room, an hour is "quite some time." Genetics research has been going on for about a century. It seems to me global warming research didn't get serious attention until the 1980s, making it a relatively new field (my stereo speakers are older than that). Yes, I misspoke to say it's in its early stages, but I still think there's a lot more work needed on some critically important questions.

   

---------------------QUOTE-------------------
Tsk tsk...
---------------------QUOTE-------------------



Do I feel chastened? Hmmmm... No.

* For the humour-impaired or terminally suspicious, no, I'm not comparing anyone here with Nazis. It's just a Seinfeld reference. You could look it up.

---------------------QUOTE-------------------



Quote (Dale Husband @ June 30 2011,23:38)

Actually, the foundations for global warming research extend all the way back to the end of the 19th Century. It actually started with this scientist:

< http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Svante_Arrhenius >

Read more here:

< http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_climate_change_science >

---------------------QUOTE-------------------



Quote (Louis @ July 01 2011,04:23)

Ah, one of those. No worries!

However people here throw the denier label around (rightly, wrongly or indifferently) denialism itself is a topic of study in its own right. The commonalities between creationist anti-science denialism and the anti-science denialism that is involved in AGW denial are stark. The same applies to any anti-science denialism I can think of. I used to have some proper resources around here somewhere, I'll see if I can dig them up.

Like anything, there's a spectrum of denial, and I don't think mere ignorance falls on it. Most people I encounter who are pro/anti AGW are pretty ill informed about it, and seem to hold those positions for other reasons. I realise anecdote =/= data, but I can hardly count my parents (for example) as AGW deniers because they simply know nothing about it, and the tiny about they do claim to know is derived solely from their choice of newspaper (The Daily Mail.....yes, it is that bad, feel my pain!). They engage in some denialist type behaviour, but they aren't informed enough to be denialists proper. This applies to the majority of creationists and other species of denialists too. They simply haven't given the subjects they are denying the effort and study they require to even engage in denialism.They might be resistant to evidence initially, but the majority of people are open to some form of new information. Obviously! Otherwise bugger all would ever change, and change it does! ;-)

A couple of initial thoughts on denialism can be found
< here, > < here, > < here, > < here, > < and here. >

Those aren't proper references, just a few things to wet your beak! Enjoy!

Louis

---------------------QUOTE-------------------


Posted by: Dale_Husband on July 02 2011,23:10

There are a lot of useful websites about this subject:

< http://www.ipcc.ch/:....: > The website of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC).

< http://www.giss.nasa.gov/:....: > The NASA Goddard Institute for Space Studies (GISS). Deals directly with researching and reporting climate science. Led by Dr. James E. Hansen.

< http://www.noaa.gov/climate....e.html: > The climate section of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA).

< http://www.realclimate.org/....ate.org > : A blog by climate scientists on the latest developments on the science. Highly technical.

< http://www.skepticalscience.com/....nce.com > : A website dealing with arguments and claims of global warming "skeptics".

< http://nsidc.org/index.h....x.html: > The National Snow and Ice Data Center (NSIDC), does research on the impact of climate change on mountain and polar ice sheets, along with snowfall patterns.

< http://www.desmogblog.com/:....: > A blog investigating critics of climate science, often revealing their connections to fossil fuel industries.

< http://www.woodfortrees.org/:....: > Shows graphic displays of various forms of climate data that the user may edit according to whatever limits they define.

< http://www.greenpeace.org/usa........a.... : >  ExxonSecrets, a project of Greenpeace which documents in interactive and graphic form the connections between global warming denialists and their corporate supporters, including political think-tanks.

< http://deepclimate.org/:....: > An exploration of the climate science “skeptic” phenomenon in Canada and beyond.  

< http://cdiac.ornl.gov/:....: > The Carbon Dioxide Information Analysis Center (CDIAC) is the primary climate-change data and information analysis center of the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE).

< http://www.globalwarmingart.com/:....: > Global Warming Art is the result of a dream that the public and educators should have easy access to the same data and results that have framed the scientific discussion of global warming and climate change.

< http://discover.itsc.uah.edu/:....: > The DISCOVER Project, the Distributed Information Services for Climate and Ocean Products and Visualizations for Earth Research.

< http://www.aip.org/history....ex.htm: > This Website, created by Spencer Weart, supplements his much shorter book, which tells the history of climate change research as a single story. On this Website you will find a more complete history in dozens of essays on separate topics, occasionally updated.

< http://www.logicalscience.com/:....: > The mission of Logical Science is to defend mainstream science. We will do this by exposing how poorly it is portrayed by the mass media and documenting the war on science that industrial and special interest groups have been waging to promote their ideology. An associated blog can be found here: < http://logicalscience.blogspot.com/....pot.com >  

< http://www.climateark.org/:....: > Climate Ark is a climate change and global warming portal, search engine and news feed that promotes public policy that addresses global climate change through reductions in carbon dioxide and other emissions, renewable energy, energy conservation and efficiency, and ending deforestation.

< http://www.acoolerclimate.com/:....: > Another website dedicated to combating misinformation about climate change.

< http://www.koshland-science-museum.org/exhibit....ex.jsp: > From the website of the Marian Koshland Science Museum, this section deals with climate change.

And last, but not least:

< http://dalehusband.wordpress.com/categor....: > The section of my Wordpress blog dealing with global warming.
Posted by: Dale_Husband on July 04 2011,04:01

< http://dalehusband.wordpress.com/2010.......warming >

 

---------------------QUOTE-------------------

That cesspool of Young-Earth Creationism, Answers in Genesis, has weighed in on the issue of global warming, coming down firmly on the side of denialism. I’m not surprized, since I always knew Creationism to be a form of evolution denialism. Denialists tend to flock together and be denialists about more than one subject, and this proves it:

< http://www.answersingenesis.org/article....warming >

Let us focus on the statements that make this piece so unscientific, if not downright rediculous.

 

---------------------QUOTE-------------------


Oddly, the church has had little to say on the issue and has made scant use of Scripture to evaluate the alleged problem.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------



Of course not! When the books of the Bible were being written, climate science didn’t even exist!

 

---------------------QUOTE-------------------
It will be shown that the Bible provides sufficient counsel to enable Christians to evaluate the claims of global warming and arrive at a confident position that is in accord with real science.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------



That’s a tall order, since there is no real science in the Bible.

 

---------------------QUOTE-------------------
The contention that man’s activities are causing global warming, as described in the media and by its advocates, is a myth. There is no reason either biblically or scientifically to fear the exaggerated and misguided claims of catastrophe as a result of increasing levels of man-made carbon dioxide (CO2).
---------------------QUOTE-------------------



They use “science” only when it suits them. That’s as bad and dishonest as denying it completely.

 

---------------------QUOTE-------------------
Al Gore contends that the greatest moral issue of our times is global warming. In addition, he and others characterize global warming, which he considers to be predominately caused by man, as a moral, ethical and spiritual challenge.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------



Making Al Gore the primary issue instead of the actual data is itself a serious weakness.

 

---------------------QUOTE-------------------
If he is right, then Christians should examine this issue and take a strong biblical position. Moral, ethical and spiritual issues are the domain of the church.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------



In other words, people should never think for themselves, but just let the church, and its interpretation of the Bible, tell them what to think.

 

---------------------QUOTE-------------------
Obviously, not even all creationists will agree with every assertion in this paper.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------



Why even mention that as an issue? Oh, because you expect all creationists to agree with every assertion in the Bible.

 

---------------------QUOTE-------------------
The spiritual implications of accepting evolution have been eloquently and comprehensively argued by many creationist organizations. Yet, for far too long the creation-evolution debate has been viewed by many, even in the church, as an abstract, academic topic with little relevance to real life.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------



Actually, most people in the church accept evolution outright, but you don’t want to admit that, do you?

 

---------------------QUOTE-------------------
Man-made global warming is a direct product of evolutionary thinking, and the potential impacts are very applicable to real life.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------



Confusing words here. I think he meant “The man-made global warming hypothesis is a direct product of evolutionary thinking.” In any case, that first part is a falsehood, since the issue of lines of organisms changing over time has nothing to do with climate change.

 

---------------------QUOTE-------------------
Proposed secular solutions to the alleged claims of global warming will directly impact everyone who depends on fossil fuels for their current life style. The issue of global warming presents biblical creationists with an opportunity to demonstrate not only the efficacy of Scripture in addressing life’s issues, but also to show how ignoring Scripture leads to unnecessary, expensive, and harmful actions.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------



Sure, just as unearthing and burning fossil fuels is never harmful. Tell that to the people living around the Gulf of Mexico, where that oil spill from BP’s broken well ruined the waters and the coast last year!

 

---------------------QUOTE-------------------
God is the creator of the universe. In His Word, the Bible, God has addressed every area of life (family, state, church, science, man, sin, etc.). God’s Word is truth. The revelation given to us in Scripture is sufficient to enable man to understand the world around him and make decisions that will honor God and benefit mankind. When faced with a challenge, a follower of Christ should first ask, “What has God said that will help me understand this issue and respond in a manner that honors Him?”
---------------------QUOTE-------------------



I already addressed these claims here: < http://dalehusband.wordpress.com/2009.......-of-god >  And if God is the creator of the universe, then what you find when you examine the universe should match what is stated in the Bible. If that were so, evolution as a credible scientific theory would never have been established. Nor would the idea that the universe is more than a few thousand years old, or even that some stars are bigger and  brighter than the Sun, as explained here: < http://dalehusband.wordpress.com/2009.......genesis > In any case, equating any man-made book with the “Word of God” should be seen as nothing more than idolatry or blasphemy: < http://dalehusband.wordpress.com/2007.......asphemy >

There follows a list of terms associated with the subject of climate change that is generally accurate.

 

---------------------QUOTE-------------------
Before our country commits to spending billions (probably trillions) of dollars on CO2 reduction, we need to consider what light the Bible can shed on this issue.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------



Strange that Answers in Genesis never says anything about the wars that have been fought in Afghanistan or Iraq or about the actions of the state of Israel, maybe because like most Christian fundamentalists, they blindly support those wars and Israel, no matter what. See this earlier entry for details: < http://dalehusband.wordpress.com/2009.......ossible >

 

---------------------QUOTE-------------------
Exactly why are global warming advocates so concerned about burning fossil fuels and the harvesting of forests? It must be kept in mind that global warming advocates are predominantly evolutionists. Al Gore readily admits that he is an evolutionist (Gore 2006, p. 160).
---------------------QUOTE-------------------



Evolution had nothing to do with the known processes of climate change, past or present.

 

---------------------QUOTE-------------------
Accordingly, they believe that there was a time in the distant past when earth’s atmosphere contained a much higher percentage of CO2 (over 21%) and no oxygen (O2). They believe the earth’s atmosphere developed O2 only as a result of photosynthesis by plants or bacteria (Bergman and Renwick 2003, p. 137). Advocates believe that forests, especially tropical rain forests, are the largest reservoir for storing carbon and generating oxygen on land. This helps explain their strong desire to protect rain forests. From an evolutionary perspective it is easy to see why preserving forests and reducing CO2 is important, even if the projected catastrophes are unfounded or exaggerated.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------



Studies of rocks from billions of years ago support these conclusions, even without reference to evolution. Plants and cyanobacteria DO release oxygen into the atmosphere. There are vast amounts of plant matter in the tropical rain forests. You need no knowledge of or belief in evolution to understand these facts.

 

---------------------QUOTE-------------------
The Bible provides frank and absolutely reliable direction for every moral issue experienced by mankind.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------



No it doesn’t! Read the book of Joshua to see a campaign of conquest and genocide by the ancient Hebrews, done under God’s total approval. Would this writer claim that genocide is moral?

 

---------------------QUOTE-------------------
The biblical position on moral issues like abortion and homosexuality are clear to those who accept the inspiration of Scripture and who understand the straightforward implications of Scripture on these issues, but other issues require thoughtful study of Scripture.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------



The Bible actually does not address the modern issue of abortion (though fundamentalists will twist biblical passages to make it appear otherwise) and it must be noted that Jesus himself said nothing about homosexuality. Do Christians really follow Jesus when they bash homosexuals based on either Old Testament  laws or the writings of Paul, who wasn’t even an original disciple of Jesus?

 

---------------------QUOTE-------------------
The Bible-science movement is keenly interested in determining the original intent of biblical passages. A joint study by the Creation Research Society and the Institute for Creation Research called Radioisotopes and the Age of the Earth (RATE) illustrates this point. The study team included a Hebrew scholar, Dr. Steven Boyd, whose task was to determine if the Genesis creation verses are narrative or poetry, a critical question. If the passages are poetry then they merely illustrate a spiritual truth, but if they are narrative then they describe real events and real people. Dr. Boyd determined that Genesis 1:1 to 2:3 is narrative with a 99.996% probability at a 99.5% confidence level (Vardiman et al. 2005, p. 690).
---------------------QUOTE-------------------



When Jesus spoke in parables, was he speaking poetry? Doesn’t look like it. In any case, it doesn’t matter, because the literal meaning of the Genesis accounts is discredited anyway. I said accounts because there are two of them and the other begins at Gen. 2:4. Dr. Boyd seems to have not looked at that one.

 

---------------------QUOTE-------------------
A created atmosphere has purpose, stability, and is more robust than a randomly evolved atmosphere.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------



Then can this writer explain why we are cursed with hurricanes, tornados, thunderstorms and other disasters resulting from atmospheric distubances? Oh, it must be due to human sin! But since animals and plants also suffer from storms, are they all sinners too?

 

---------------------QUOTE-------------------
Aside from all the other reasons for which God may have created plants, the Bible specifically states that He made them for human and animal food, and this is largely being ignored by global warming advocates.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------



Aside from some plants being poisonous to us, it must be noted that the effect of global warming on agriculture is indeed a major concern of scientists researching climate change.

 

---------------------QUOTE-------------------
Since all animals and mankind were vegetarians originally, plants were created as a reliable and sustainable source of food.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------



Idiotic premise leading to a bad conclusion. If many animals became carnivores later, that means they EVOLVED, right? I guess Creationists deny evolution when it offends them and affirms it when it suits their purposes. That’s flatly dishonest.

 

---------------------QUOTE-------------------
As people began eating meat, they became even more dependent on vegetation as a source of food because the animals we eat all must consume multiple pounds of vegetation for each pound of meat produced.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------



Al Gore himself has called for people to eat less meat, and it is possible that over time more and more people will become vegetarian or vegan. But while the Old Testament laws forbid the eating of certain types of meat, they also calls for animal sacrifice as a regular religious ritual.

 

---------------------QUOTE-------------------
While it is true that harvesting of forest products should be done in line with intelligent use of that ecosystem, unless forests are periodically harvested, allowing new growth and providing a useful product, they have little direct economic benefit for mankind. As the human population increases then it is reasonable to convert forests to the production of food and building material. From a creation perspective there is nothing sacred about preserving forests. They are to be efficiently and effectively managed for the benefit of mankind. Nonetheless, there is little justification for the wanton destruction of forests for short-term economic benefit. As stewards accountable to God we should manage all earth resources with a long-term, biblical, perspective.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------



Unless you also beleive that Jesus will eventually return to save humanity from the anti-Christ. Then you can chop down forests at will and wait for Jesus to bail us out later.

 

---------------------QUOTE-------------------
It should also be noted that as plants began growing and covering the earth following Creation week, they were removing CO2 from the environment. Land plants removed CO2 from the atmosphere while marine plants removed CO2 from the ocean. In addition, marine animals that developed carbonate shells also removed CO2 from the ocean.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------



The Bible does not actually say any such thing.

 

---------------------QUOTE-------------------
God never rebuked mankind for mining, farming, ranching, or cutting trees for building projects. All of these activities are part of man’s God-given rule over the earth. Throughout Scripture, however, God has repeatedly rebuked man for disobedience to His moral commands.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------



People who lived thousands of years ago had no idea how limited the Earth really was or how tremendous their populations would eventually get. Hench their limited priorities, which they transmitted to their “Scripture” and put in God’s mouth.

 

---------------------QUOTE-------------------
The Flood likely increased the temperature of the ocean. As we will see later, a warm sea following the Flood helps explain another important post-Flood phenomena, the ice age.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------



Bull$#it. Ice ages have never been mentioned in the book of Genesis or anywhere else in the Bible.

 

---------------------QUOTE-------------------
At Creation and immediately after the Flood, plants were just beginning to cover the earth yet there was no shortage of oxygen in the atmosphere. God established enough oxygen in the original atmosphere to sustain life throughout the duration of the earth. This highlights the fact that plants are not necessary for generating oxygen.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------



Clearly, this moron does not know what a “fact” is. It is a confirmed observation. Where is the confirmed observation that plants are not necessary for generating oxygen? Actually, there would have been plants, including algae, in the oceans that could have continued to provide oxygen throughout the flood.

 

---------------------QUOTE-------------------
As an aside, during the Flood every man and animal on the ark would have been classified as an “endangered species” according to current definition. All animal life today is descended from one or a few pairs of animals that were carried on the ark.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------



If that is true, then all animals should indicate via their genomes a “bottleneck effect” showing that they are all descended from a very few ancestors recently. And by “all animal life” would that include fish, whales, crabs, and other animals that live in the oceans? Could the ark have held all of these species?

 

---------------------QUOTE-------------------
The argument over burning fossil fuels versus ethanol can be reduced to a question of whether it is best to burn old plants or new plants. Burning old plants (fossil fuels) is much more efficient, and therefore “green.”
---------------------QUOTE-------------------



This is sheer insanity. Ethanol comes from plants growing today that can be grown again and thus ethanol is a renewable resource. By contrast, coal, oil, and other fossil fuels, if they were made during the flood, are indeed nonrenewable. Coal is FAR more polluting than any other fuel, since it is full of impurities that ethanol produced by man from agriculture would not have.

 

---------------------QUOTE-------------------
Considering the total volume of fossil fuel captured in rocks, and the volume of carbonate rocks, it can be seen that a significant amount of CO2 has been removed from the pre-Flood environment (atmosphere and ocean) and locked up in sedimentary formations. Another significant volume of CO2 has been removed since the Flood and is tied up in plants and animals that have subsequently developed. As a result of burying a major proportion of earth’s plant and animal life, the Flood likely caused far greater changes to atmospheric gases than any current global warming scenario.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------



Strangly, most scientists would agree with this, except they would see the process as taking place over millions of years and due to many local floods rather than only one global flood.

 

---------------------QUOTE-------------------
Global warming is described as a worldwide catastrophe by the radical environmentalists and the media. The tribulation of Revelation certainly contains events that sound like some of the dire predictions associated with global warming. Unlike global warming, the tribulation is initiated directly by God, as judgment on sinful mankind, and is a sudden, not a gradual change. People undergoing the tribulation realize that it is from God, as a result of their sinful behavior, but they intentionally refuse to repent. We should not confuse the claims of global warming with tribulation events.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------



What a convenient disclaimer. I guess if you want to make a rationalization for Big Business to continue abusing the ecosystems of the world, this is a perfect example. I suppose they could have claimed that people would blame global warming for the disasters depicted in Revelation and thus refuse to repent, but that would have violated their own assumptions about people who do not follow their assumptions (because they claim such people are not only mistaken, but downright evil and stupid). Clearly, this writer didn’t think things through before he submitted this huge load of nonsense to Answers in Genesis. He was too obsessed with slandering opponents of Creationism.

 

---------------------QUOTE-------------------
God is in absolute control of His creation. He is the Creator (Genesis 1 and 2). God destroyed His creation in the days of Noah with a worldwide flood (Genesis 7–9). God sets the boundary for the seas (Job 38:8–11, Psalm 104:9, Jeremiah 5:22) and controls the weather: lightning (Job 28:26, 37:3), hail (Job 38:22, Psalm 147:17, Haggai 2:17), rain (Job 28:26, 37:6, Psalm 147:8), and snow (Job 37:6, 38:22, Psalm 147:16). Someday God will destroy this earth and establish a new heaven and a new earth (Revelation 21:1). Man is not in control of the weather and this present earth is temporary.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------



Is this writer sure he is not describing the gods of Hinduism? No wonder some Christian fundamentalists claim that AIDS, earthquakes, hurricanes and other natural disasters are punishments from God. With a sadistic God like this, who needs Satan?

The rest of that article is just more fallacious and downright fraudulant crap, repeating and detailing the earlier unsupported assertions, all based on the blind assumption that the statements in the Bible are all literally true. They also recycle many global warming denialist canards.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------


Posted by: Badger3k on July 04 2011,09:05

Quote (Dale_Husband @ July 04 2011,04:01)
 

---------------------QUOTE-------------------
The Bible provides frank and absolutely reliable direction for every moral issue experienced by mankind.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------



No it doesn’t! Read the book of Joshua to see a campaign of conquest and genocide by the ancient Hebrews, done under God’s total approval. Would this writer claim that genocide is moral?
---------------------QUOTE-------------------


I would hazard a guess, that ala William Lane Craig, they would say - yes.
Posted by: Dale_Husband on July 09 2011,20:24

Quote (Robin @ July 08 2011,10:40)


Sorry to take so long to respond to this, Trubble - was away on a trip. Anywhooo...

   
Quote (Trubble @ June 30 2011,15:55)
   
Quote (Robin @ June 29 2011,09:35)
See...this kind of defensiveness is a real clue that you have an agenda. People without agendas merely ask, "what's a global warming denier?" and then discuss the concept. By immediately distancing yourself from the issue ('no really...I don't have a dog in this fight!!!') and at the same time calling us "zealots", you've tipped your hand.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------



Great. That's the very reaction I wanted to preempt. My fault, I probably should have approached the counter with more care, like George placing his order with the Soup Nazi.*
---------------------QUOTE-------------------



Funny. However, yet again you imply that in order to deal with this subject, we (the Global Warming Nazis) need to handled with defensively (that's what George did AND still didn't get any soup). Seems an odd way of being "neutral" on the subject. Just sayin'...

   

---------------------QUOTE-------------------
I used "you zealots" as a tongue-in-cheek reference to the kind of person who would immediately see my questions as masking some kind of anti-science agenda. In retrospect, perhaps a bad choice of words, but I didn't actually think people here would be that sensitive.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------



Here's the thing - if you actually thought we wouldn't be "that sensitive" AND you didn't really have an agenda to poke the bear, you'd have just asked the question neutrally to...you know...start a neutral discussion. Folks who have been here for a long time can toss out tongue-in-cheek comments and get a chortle (or guffaw or giggle or even a reference to their mom**), but your opening with such as a way of introduction smells defensive right off the bat and really does scream "AGENDA!" Sorry if I misinterpreted your message, but that's the way it comes across.

   

---------------------QUOTE-------------------
My "agenda" was to try to elaborate the denier label. It seems to be thrown around pretty carelessly at times, so I was curious where people here draw the line. I gave specific examples in order to get specific answers, instead of generalities. Several people provided thoughtful answers. To them, thanks.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------



You're welcome.

   

---------------------QUOTE-------------------
My own view is that global warming is real, is serious, and is at least largely caused by human activity. But I also think drastic action is impractical right now, so we should be looking at what is realistically doable. I know some would label that view as "denial", which is why I asked.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------



Just  curious - why didn't you just state this in the first place?

I'm really shocked that anyone would find the above position to be one of denial in that you've not actually denied anything. Not that I don't recognize that there are people out there who are irrational and/or who don't actually take into account what someone actually writes or states, but I really can't believe the majority of folk dealing in this issue are that way. Of course, it has become rather political, so what do I know?

In any event, I certainly don't see the above as falling into the denial category. Seems rather straight forward to me.

   

---------------------QUOTE-------------------
Also for the record, I've been coming to this site almost daily for about five years, mainly for the funny and to keep up with the creationism issue, which I find fascinating. I just don't make posts, because I don't have any particular expertise in science, just a layman's interest and an undergrad anthro degree.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------



Good to know, though I'm sure you'll forgive those of us who don't know what lurkers are regulars. ;)

   

---------------------QUOTE-------------------
   

---------------------QUOTE-------------------
Oh...and the area of research isn't in the early stages; it's been going on for quite some time.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------



Well, I guess it's all relative. If you're sitting in a doctor's waiting room, an hour is "quite some time." Genetics research has been going on for about a century. It seems to me global warming research didn't get serious attention until the 1980s, making it a relatively new field (my stereo speakers are older than that). Yes, I misspoke to say it's in its early stages, but I still think there's a lot more work needed on some critically important questions.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------



Global Warming/Climate Change research has been going on since the 1930s. Guy Stewart Callendar did simple model calculations back in 1938 noting the contribution of CO2 to the increase in temperature. Helmut Lansberg expanded on this back in 1946. This isn't a relatively new field. People have gotten that impression since there was such a media frenzy around the subject in the 80s and because, unfortunately, human memory is short.

The real issue though is that most folks confuse Global Warming science with Global Warming policy. The former may well inspire a stance on the latter, but to blame the former for the need for the latter - as so many denialists seem to do - is just inane. Further, to try to equivocate the former with the latter - as the media and deninalists do with abandon - just makes those folks and their arguments look ignorant and petty.

I don't necessarily disagree that more research is warranted, but I do disagree with the reasons. There aren't any "critically important questions" from a scientific POV. There may well be some (likely a bunch) from a policy POV, but those are not going to be addressed by more research. Those questions can only be addressed by people sitting down and agreeing to discuss issues honestly and agreeing to make hard, fact-based decisions. Period. Whether man's energy use is a 98% factor in climate change or a 0.00342% fact is irrelevant to the question of whether we, as humans, determine that we can affect the current rate of change and whether it is in our interest to do so. The former is a scientific question, the latter is policy question.

   

---------------------QUOTE-------------------
     

---------------------QUOTE-------------------
Tsk tsk...
---------------------QUOTE-------------------



Do I feel chastened? Hmmmm... No.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------



Well, I was chastising you for not even doing a quick Google search before making a blanket claim. Given that you appeared defensive and appeared to have an agenda, it seemed that you were just making something up. Even though you apparently aren't starting from an agenda and are actually just a layman doesn't excuse not doing a rudimentary search. Research isn't limited to the professional scientists and really...in this day and age of information, it isn't hard just to check a few sources.

Here's one:

< http://www.aip.org/history/climate/timeline.htm >

   

---------------------QUOTE-------------------
* For the humour-impaired or terminally suspicious, no, I'm not comparing anyone here with Nazis. It's just a Seinfeld reference. You could look it up.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------



** For Louis or Arden

---------------------QUOTE-------------------


Posted by: Trubble on July 12 2011,01:06

Quote (Robin @ July 08 2011,10:40)

Well, I was chastising you for not even doing a quick Google search before making a blanket claim.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------



What blanket claim are you referring to? I didn't think I had made one.

 

---------------------QUOTE-------------------
Given that you appeared defensive and appeared to have an agenda, it seemed that you were just making something up.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------



What "something" appeared to be made up? I asked a question.

 

---------------------QUOTE-------------------
Even though you apparently aren't starting from an agenda and are actually just a layman doesn't excuse not doing a rudimentary search. Research isn't limited to the professional scientists and really...in this day and age of information, it isn't hard just to check a few sources.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------



What research should I have done to determine what constitutes "climate change denial"? Maybe I could have gone to a few discussion boards and asked some participants? No, wait...

Actually, fuck it, never mind. I have no stomach for this kind of thing. It just makes me grumpy and out of sorts. I'll just go back to lurking.
Posted by: Robin on July 12 2011,09:47

Quote (Trubble @ July 12 2011,01:06)
Quote (Robin @ July 08 2011,10:40)

Well, I was chastising you for not even doing a quick Google search before making a blanket claim.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------



What blanket claim are you referring to? I didn't think I had made one.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------



This:



---------------------QUOTE-------------------
I just find it strange that such a sharp demarcation is drawn on an area of research that is really still in its early stages.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------



You then followed with this:



---------------------QUOTE-------------------
Well, I guess it's all relative. If you're sitting in a doctor's waiting room, an hour is "quite some time." Genetics research has been going on for about a century. It seems to me global warming research didn't get serious attention until the 1980s, making it a relatively new field (my stereo speakers are older than that). Yes, I misspoke to say it's in its early stages, but I still think there's a lot more work needed on some critically important questions.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------



...which was not accurate either.



---------------------QUOTE-------------------
   

---------------------QUOTE-------------------
Given that you appeared defensive and appeared to have an agenda, it seemed that you were just making something up.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------



What "something" appeared to be made up? I asked a question.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------



To elaborate, the way you approached the subject (appearing defensive in your wording, calling folks here "zealots", creating a list of possible vague "exceptions" to the concept of "denialist", and confusing policy issues with science issues lead me (at least) to conclude you had an agenda regarding the subject. Couple that with the blanket statement that global warming science is a "relatively new field" made the claim appear to be completely made up.



---------------------QUOTE-------------------
   

---------------------QUOTE-------------------
Even though you apparently aren't starting from an agenda and are actually just a layman doesn't excuse not doing a rudimentary search. Research isn't limited to the professional scientists and really...in this day and age of information, it isn't hard just to check a few sources.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------



What research should I have done to determine what constitutes "climate change denial"? Maybe I could have gone to a few discussion boards and asked some participants? No, wait...
---------------------QUOTE-------------------



Sorry...apparently I wasn't clear. I wasn't chastising you for asking a question about global warming denial; I was chastising you for claiming that global warming science is a relatively new field without first doing a rudimentary check to see how long the research has actually been going on.



---------------------QUOTE-------------------
Actually, fuck it, never mind. I have no stomach for this kind of thing. It just makes me grumpy and out of sorts. I'll just go back to lurking.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------



What kind of thing? Being corrected for being inaccurate and incomplete? That's what science is all about. If you're at all interested in science, of which global warming research is a part, then correction is going to be a part of any discussion.

But even that aside, if you've really been a lurker here for as long as you claim, then try just for a brief moment to consider your first post and then our discussion from my POV. You, a professed lurker who could not (by definition) have an established MO in this group of folks, posts a question about denialism with a number of caveats and even a rather inflammatory label ("you zealots"). After five years here you must realize that a good number of anti-science folks come here and post similarly phrased questions hoping that someone here will answer one of the caveat "gotchas" so the poster can than have his or her agenda based quote mine or just an opportunity to gloat and troll. How am I supposed to know the difference between your post and those others? Seriously, what about your post do you think is different from my POV?

And why should anyone here at this point be expected to give any poster the benefit of the doubt, particularly if the poster in question isn't starting a discussion with a neutral post? You had the option of just asking the question without any baggage, but you chose to be tongue-in-cheek and set-up some pretty specific exceptions in an arena you freely admit you aren't well versed in and on a forum you freely admit to being not well known. Why are you surprised I took it wrong and why are you now getting all cranky with my responses?

Actually, what's really odd is that you've chosen to keep on the same track instead of trying to start over or just just admitting that your initial approach didn't work as intended and saying you'd like to address the responses I and others gave to your very specific questions. Why get into all this other noise if you are really interested in the specifics of what constitutes a global warming denialist?

I realize it may look like I'm trying to give you a hard time, and while that partially true (given that you've chosen not to address my comments on the actual science of global warming), I'm also trying to continue the discussion because I'm interested in what your take on it is. I'm interested in other people's thoughts on the subject of both the science and the policy. But I'm not going to let anyone, layman or professional, get away with laziness and inaccuracy.
Posted by: Jim_Wynne on July 12 2011,12:30

Trubble,

Your opening salvo had "agenda" written all over it. The ones who declaim the loudest about not having an agenda are the ones most likely to have one--you protest too much, in other words.

There are two varieties of denialists when it comes to global warming--those who deny that it's happening at all, and those who acknowledge it but deny anthropogenic causes.  

Your question, if I understand it, is whether or not a person who acknowledges anthropogenic global warming but doesn't want to take "drastic" measures in response to it may be considered a denialist.  Perhaps, but in a completely different discussion and context.  Note that your reference to "drastic" measures connotes a bit of an agenda in itself.
Posted by: dhogaza on July 12 2011,15:39



---------------------QUOTE-------------------
It seems to me global warming research didn't get serious attention until the 1980s
---------------------QUOTE-------------------



< This guy is rolling in his grave ... >
Posted by: Erasmus, FCD on July 12 2011,16:16

Quote (dhogaza @ July 12 2011,16:39)


---------------------QUOTE-------------------
It seems to me global warming research didn't get serious attention until the 1980s
---------------------QUOTE-------------------



< This guy is rolling in his grave ... >
---------------------QUOTE-------------------


maybe, or maybe he is laughing about what "seems" to "Trubble"

after all you can't blame a man for what "seems to him"!!!! Of course, you can blame a dumb sombitch for not looking but that could be a whole nutha level
Posted by: dhogaza on July 12 2011,23:02



---------------------QUOTE-------------------
after all you can't blame a man for what "seems to him"!!!!
---------------------QUOTE-------------------



Oh, yes, you can.  It's an admission of not having done any research at all at a level that, given google or even bing (good god), would show him that he was totally mistaken.

No excuses ... pillory the dude for his sillinesses (or, if you're feeling particularly Christian, crucify him!)
Posted by: Trubble on July 13 2011,10:43

I was aware of Arrhenius, thanks. He was the first to posit the link between human-generated CO2 and climate change. But his theory was not accepted by the mainstream for many decades.

Some excerpts from the wikipedia pages mentioned above:



---------------------QUOTE-------------------
While a few early 20th-Century scientists supported Arrhenius' work, including E. O. Hulburt and Guy Stewart Callendar, most scientific opinion disputed or ignored it through the early 1950s.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------



and



---------------------QUOTE-------------------
In the late 19th century, scientists first argued that human emissions of greenhouse gases could change the climate, but the calculations were disputed. In the 1950s and 1960s, scientists increasingly thought that human activity could change the climate on a timescale of decades, but were unsure whether the net impact would be to warm or cool the climate. During the 1970s, scientific opinion increasingly favored the warming viewpoint. In the 1980s the consensus position formed that human activity was in the process of warming the climate...
---------------------QUOTE-------------------



...which is why I called it a relatively new field (keep in mind what "relatively" means -- it's not an absolute) and why I referenced the 1980s as when things got serious. On reflection, I was probably off by a decade or so.

I'm mostly interested in the nuts and bolts elements of the work, less than the theoretical underpinnings. Such as the development of reliable models that could tell us, for example, if we reduce CO2 emissions to x level, it will have y effect on sea levels, precipitation, glacier formation, or whatever. It seems to me that work is still at a relatively early stage. But I could well be ignorant about the latest developments.
Posted by: Dale_Husband on July 15 2011,11:39

Quote (Trubble @ July 13 2011,10:43)
I was aware of Arrhenius, thanks. He was the first to posit the link between human-generated CO2 and climate change. But his theory was not accepted by the mainstream for many decades.

Some excerpts from the wikipedia pages mentioned above:

   

---------------------QUOTE-------------------
While a few early 20th-Century scientists supported Arrhenius' work, including E. O. Hulburt and Guy Stewart Callendar, most scientific opinion disputed or ignored it through the early 1950s.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------



and

   

---------------------QUOTE-------------------
In the late 19th century, scientists first argued that human emissions of greenhouse gases could change the climate, but the calculations were disputed. In the 1950s and 1960s, scientists increasingly thought that human activity could change the climate on a timescale of decades, but were unsure whether the net impact would be to warm or cool the climate. During the 1970s, scientific opinion increasingly favored the warming viewpoint. In the 1980s the consensus position formed that human activity was in the process of warming the climate...
---------------------QUOTE-------------------



...which is why I called it a relatively new field (keep in mind what "relatively" means -- it's not an absolute) and why I referenced the 1980s as when things got serious. On reflection, I was probably off by a decade or so.

I'm mostly interested in the nuts and bolts elements of the work, less than the theoretical underpinnings. Such as the development of reliable models that could tell us, for example, if we reduce CO2 emissions to x level, it will have y effect on sea levels, precipitation, glacier formation, or whatever. It seems to me that work is still at a relatively early stage. But I could well be ignorant about the latest developments.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------


Did it ever occur to you that giant oil companies, like the supermassive Standard Oil of J. D. Rockerfeller, were trying to interfer with scientific studies that threatened their economic interests even a century ago? Indeed, it was so powerful that the U S government forced it to break up. And we have evidence that ExxonMobil, a direct descendant of Standard Oil, has been funding global warming denialist groups in recent years.
Posted by: OgreMkV on July 15 2011,12:15

Quote (Dale_Husband @ July 15 2011,11:39)
Quote (Trubble @ July 13 2011,10:43)
I was aware of Arrhenius, thanks. He was the first to posit the link between human-generated CO2 and climate change. But his theory was not accepted by the mainstream for many decades.

Some excerpts from the wikipedia pages mentioned above:

   

---------------------QUOTE-------------------
While a few early 20th-Century scientists supported Arrhenius' work, including E. O. Hulburt and Guy Stewart Callendar, most scientific opinion disputed or ignored it through the early 1950s.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------



and

   

---------------------QUOTE-------------------
In the late 19th century, scientists first argued that human emissions of greenhouse gases could change the climate, but the calculations were disputed. In the 1950s and 1960s, scientists increasingly thought that human activity could change the climate on a timescale of decades, but were unsure whether the net impact would be to warm or cool the climate. During the 1970s, scientific opinion increasingly favored the warming viewpoint. In the 1980s the consensus position formed that human activity was in the process of warming the climate...
---------------------QUOTE-------------------



...which is why I called it a relatively new field (keep in mind what "relatively" means -- it's not an absolute) and why I referenced the 1980s as when things got serious. On reflection, I was probably off by a decade or so.

I'm mostly interested in the nuts and bolts elements of the work, less than the theoretical underpinnings. Such as the development of reliable models that could tell us, for example, if we reduce CO2 emissions to x level, it will have y effect on sea levels, precipitation, glacier formation, or whatever. It seems to me that work is still at a relatively early stage. But I could well be ignorant about the latest developments.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------


Did it ever occur to you that giant oil companies, like the supermassive Standard Oil of J. D. Rockerfeller, were trying to interfer with scientific studies that threatened their economic interests even a century ago? Indeed, it was so powerful that the U S government forced it to break up. And we have evidence that ExxonMobil, a direct descendant of Standard Oil, has been funding global warming denialist groups in recent years.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------


It gets even worse when there are media outlets that are specifically encouraging disbelief in science and scientists.
Posted by: Trubble on July 15 2011,12:57

Quote (Dale_Husband @ July 15 2011,11:39)
Did it ever occur to you that giant oil companies, like the supermassive Standard Oil of J. D. Rockerfeller, were trying to interfer with scientific studies that threatened their economic interests even a century ago? Indeed, it was so powerful that the U S government forced it to break up. And we have evidence that ExxonMobil, a direct descendant of Standard Oil, has been funding global warming denialist groups in recent years.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------



I didn't know about Standard Oil trying to interfere with science a century ago, but that doesn't surprise me, given what I've read about the robber barons. Do you have a reference? I'm curious to see what studies they tried to quash.

I certainly was aware that the oil companies have given money to global warming denialists. That's well documented.

But what does that have to do with what I posted?
Posted by: Louis on July 15 2011,13:10

Trubble,

Am I right in thinking your sticking point here is to do with the use of the word(s) "denial"/"denialist"/"denier"/"denialism"?

If so I gave you (the bare beginnings of) an answer a while back. Tautologous though it sounds, many of the people who might be designated "global warming denialists/deniers" are so designated because they engage in pretty standard denialist tactics. The fact that it's to do with global warming and not other common denialist topics like, say, The Holocaust, evolutionary biology, dose response relationships in medicinal chemistry (think: homeopathy) etc is immaterial. The subject of the denial is  not relevant, the techniques/tactics/methods are.

In the things I linked above previously, you can find the beginnings of a discussion about why those terms are used, when and for what reasons.

Louis
Posted by: Trubble on July 15 2011,14:26

Thanks, Louis. My original question has been adequately answered, by several people including yourself. I think the "denier" label is sometimes applied to people who I don't think are denying the reality or seriousness of climate change, only going against the mainstream on some of the details or suggested solutions. I think that tactic is counter-productive. But no one here seems to support it, which is good.

My "sticking point" now is that I don't appreciate being accused of having some kind of dishonest agenda, or of being a "dumb sumbitch" too lazy or stupid to use Google. I said earlier I'd go back to lurking, because I don't enjoy this kind of exchange ("Jane, you ignorant slut..."), but I guess I've been sucked in now.

Anyway, my main interest is in exploring the disconnect between the scientific consensus and the public policy side. I think there are a lot of reasons why the general public is still skeptical, and some (not all) of those reasons relate to the way the scientific community overall is handling the issue. This is a teaching moment, and when a student isn't getting it, it's the teacher's responsibility to find a way to get through.

My profession is communications, so crafting messages so they'll resonate with a target audience is something I know a little about. Hence my orientation to this.
Posted by: OgreMkV on July 15 2011,14:43

Quote (Trubble @ July 15 2011,14:26)
Thanks, Louis. My original question has been adequately answered, by several people including yourself. I think the "denier" label is sometimes applied to people who I don't think are denying the reality or seriousness of climate change, only going against the mainstream on some of the details or suggested solutions. I think that tactic is counter-productive. But no one here seems to support it, which is good.

My "sticking point" now is that I don't appreciate being accused of having some kind of dishonest agenda, or of being a "dumb sumbitch" too lazy or stupid to use Google. I said earlier I'd go back to lurking, because I don't enjoy this kind of exchange ("Jane, you ignorant slut..."), but I guess I've been sucked in now.

Anyway, my main interest is in exploring the disconnect between the scientific consensus and the public policy side. I think there are a lot of reasons why the general public is still skeptical, and some (not all) of those reasons relate to the way the scientific community overall is handling the issue. This is a teaching moment, and when a student isn't getting it, it's the teacher's responsibility to find a way to get through.

My profession is communications, so crafting messages so they'll resonate with a target audience is something I know a little about. Hence my orientation to this.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------


Trubble, I think think you will find (at least in the communication front) that science is losing badly.

There are some 'news' outlets that have specifically been pushing a global warming denial platform.  Unfortunately because they say other things that people want to hear (preaching to the choir), their statements about global warming (and other things) are taken at face value by the viewers.

The news has sexy anchors paid megabucks to say what they are told to say.  Science has the dry facts and generally unattractive personalities (in both meanings of the word).

Science is hard, belief is easy.
Posted by: Tracy P. Hamilton on July 15 2011,16:12

Dave Springer (DaveScot) at the world's best science blog (LOL):


---------------------QUOTE-------------------
Dave Springer says:
July 13, 2011 at 11:37 pm

R. Gates says:
July 13, 2011 at 7:27 pm
“Let’s put it this way, if someone told me we could keep CO2 in the range it’s been during the time our civilizations came into being because the climate was conducive to grain plants which allowed us to even have civilization, or we could allow CO2 to go to levels when human ancestors were tree-shrews and the world was covered with steaming jungles and there were no grains at all…I’ll take the range in which our civilization has come into being. Letting CO2 continually rise, is conducting a huge experiment (rather like rolling the dice) on the future of the planet. Last time I checked, we haven’t got a spare in case we bet wrong”

Those would be the same CO2 levels that allowed the formation of glaciers a mile thick over everything north of Virginia for 100,000 years with 10,000 year interglacial periods. The current interglacial began over 10,000 years ago.

The level of ignorance in your blitherings, Gates, never ceases to amaze me.

---------------------QUOTE-------------------



< http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Vostok_Petit_data.svg >
CO2 at end of ice age right before holocene: 200 ppm
CO2 during interglacials 280 ppm
< http://www.geocraft.com/WVFossils/Carboniferous_climate.html >
CO2 during Jurassic, over 2000 ppm
Posted by: Dale_Husband on July 16 2011,04:18

Quote (Trubble @ July 15 2011,12:57)
 
Quote (Dale_Husband @ July 15 2011,11:39)
Did it ever occur to you that giant oil companies, like the supermassive Standard Oil of J. D. Rockerfeller, were trying to interfer with scientific studies that threatened their economic interests even a century ago? Indeed, it was so powerful that the U S government forced it to break up. And we have evidence that ExxonMobil, a direct descendant of Standard Oil, has been funding global warming denialist groups in recent years.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------



I didn't know about Standard Oil trying to interfere with science a century ago, but that doesn't surprise me, given what I've read about the robber barons. Do you have a reference? I'm curious to see what studies they tried to quash.

I certainly was aware that the oil companies have given money to global warming denialists. That's well documented.

But what does that have to do with what I posted?
---------------------QUOTE-------------------


No direct evidence, merely an inference based on what you said and on what I know about the obscenely powerful robber barons themselves. Indeed, I was asking a rhetorical question, not making an assertion.

My point, of course, is that we must always be wary of corporate interference in both scientific research and the communication of such research to the public.
Posted by: Robin on July 18 2011,08:08

Nothing specific to add, but I wanted to just say I appreciate the approach, Trubble.
Posted by: guthrie on July 21 2011,18:19

Quote (Trubble @ July 15 2011,14:26)
Thanks, Louis. My original question has been adequately answered, by several people including yourself. I think the "denier" label is sometimes applied to people who I don't think are denying the reality or seriousness of climate change, only going against the mainstream on some of the details or suggested solutions. I think that tactic is counter-productive. But no one here seems to support it, which is good.

My "sticking point" now is that I don't appreciate being accused of having some kind of dishonest agenda, or of being a "dumb sumbitch" too lazy or stupid to use Google. I said earlier I'd go back to lurking, because I don't enjoy this kind of exchange ("Jane, you ignorant slut..."), but I guess I've been sucked in now.

Anyway, my main interest is in exploring the disconnect between the scientific consensus and the public policy side. I think there are a lot of reasons why the general public is still skeptical, and some (not all) of those reasons relate to the way the scientific community overall is handling the issue. This is a teaching moment, and when a student isn't getting it, it's the teacher's responsibility to find a way to get through.

My profession is communications, so crafting messages so they'll resonate with a target audience is something I know a little about. Hence my orientation to this.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------


Here's a blog run by someone who is more of a policy person:
< http://shewonk.wordpress.com >

Although she seems to be spending less time discussing that sort of thing and more on idiocies of deniers.
Posted by: OgreMkV on July 28 2011,22:46

JoeG is a global warming denier to.  His favorite player in that arena... Spencer.

Nevermind.
Posted by: Tracy P. Hamilton on July 29 2011,10:44

News!

---------------------QUOTE-------------------
Current coverage interrupted: Global climate disaster averted
---------------------QUOTE-------------------



Eh, not really.  The Bill Dembski of climate - Roy Spencer - is a legend in his own mind.  However, the IDiots eat it up uncriticially.

Joseph, sooper -genius chimes in with a link:

---------------------QUOTE-------------------
5

Joseph

07/28/2011

8:46 pm

That would explain:

Why Hasn’t the Earth Warmed in Nearly 15 Years?
---------------------QUOTE-------------------



Of course the earth has warmed in the past 15 years.  0.12 degrees per decade +/- 0.12.  Only an IDiot would fall for someone calling that zero.
Posted by: OgreMkV on July 29 2011,11:43

Quote (Tracy P. Hamilton @ July 29 2011,10:44)
News!

---------------------QUOTE-------------------
Current coverage interrupted: Global climate disaster averted
---------------------QUOTE-------------------



Eh, not really.  The Bill Dembski of climate - Roy Spencer - is a legend in his own mind.  However, the IDiots eat it up uncriticially.

Joseph, sooper -genius chimes in with a link:

---------------------QUOTE-------------------
5

Joseph

07/28/2011

8:46 pm

That would explain:

Why Hasn’t the Earth Warmed in Nearly 15 Years?
---------------------QUOTE-------------------



Of course the earth has warmed in the past 15 years.  0.12 degrees per decade +/- 0.12.  Only an IDiot would fall for someone calling that zero.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------


I saw a good one yesterday.  Here: < http://thinkprogress.org/romm....e-media >

July 2011 number of records in each category.

•All-Time Highest Maximum Temperature: 70
•All-Time Highest Minimum Temperature: 175
•Monthly Highest Maximum Temperature: 125
•Monthly Highest Minimum Temperature: 330
•Daily Highest Maximum Temperature: 2,125
•Daily Highest Minimum Temperature: 4,787

IOW in July 2011, on average (and I'm being generous because July isn't over so far), 71 temperature locations in the US per day had record breaking high temperatures.  Almost 150 per day had record breaking highest minimum temperatures and 2 locations per day had their Highest Temp ever recorded.
Posted by: Joe G on July 29 2011,12:26

Quote (OgreMkV @ July 28 2011,22:46)
JoeG is a global warming denier to.  His favorite player in that arena... Spencer.

Nevermind.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------


Kevin, As usual you are lying. I do not deny the earth is warming and even posted that on your blog.

I do say it is a good thing and I also say that soot, not CO2, is responsible for melting glaciers and ice-packs.

Look it up- soot and global warming- or just continue to be a little lying faggot. Your choice...
Posted by: OgreMkV on July 29 2011,13:04

Quote (Joe G @ July 29 2011,12:26)
Quote (OgreMkV @ July 28 2011,22:46)
JoeG is a global warming denier to.  His favorite player in that arena... Spencer.

Nevermind.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------


Kevin, As usual you are lying. I do not deny the earth is warming and even posted that on your blog.

I do say it is a good thing and I also say that soot, not CO2, is responsible for melting glaciers and ice-packs.

Look it up- soot and global warming- or just continue to be a little lying faggot. Your choice...
---------------------QUOTE-------------------


I'm sorry Joe.  I shoudl have spoken very explicitly since you do not understand the common vernacular and insist on your own definitions of common words and phrases.

Joe is someone who disbelieves in Anthropological Global Warming.

He is, of course, still wrong.
Posted by: midwifetoad on July 29 2011,13:24

Perhaps Joe has trouble distinguishing albedo from libido. Could interfere with getting his ashes hauled.
Posted by: Joe G on July 29 2011,13:31

Quote (OgreMkV @ July 29 2011,13:04)
Quote (Joe G @ July 29 2011,12:26)
Quote (OgreMkV @ July 28 2011,22:46)
JoeG is a global warming denier to.  His favorite player in that arena... Spencer.

Nevermind.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------


Kevin, As usual you are lying. I do not deny the earth is warming and even posted that on your blog.

I do say it is a good thing and I also say that soot, not CO2, is responsible for melting glaciers and ice-packs.

Look it up- soot and global warming- or just continue to be a little lying faggot. Your choice...
---------------------QUOTE-------------------


I'm sorry Joe.  I shoudl have spoken very explicitly since you do not understand the common vernacular and insist on your own definitions of common words and phrases.

Joe is someone who disbelieves in Anthropological Global Warming.

He is, of course, still wrong.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------


Geez, Kevin is forced to lie again.

No, Kevin, I have never insisted on my own definitions of common words and phrases. You are a little, lying faggot.

And I do say that humans are causing problems- black roofs, asphalt, clear-cutting, SOOT- again you are a fucking little-minded toadstool.
Posted by: Tracy P. Hamilton on July 29 2011,13:41

Quote (Joe G @ July 29 2011,12:26)
 
Quote (OgreMkV @ July 28 2011,22:46)
JoeG is a global warming denier to.  His favorite player in that arena... Spencer.

Nevermind.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------


Kevin, As usual you are lying. I do not deny the earth is warming and even posted that on your blog.

I do say it is a good thing and I also say that soot, not CO2, is responsible for melting glaciers and ice-packs.

Look it up- soot and global warming- or just continue to be a little lying faggot. Your choice...
---------------------QUOTE-------------------



What makes you think that soot warming means that increasing CO2 does not also cause warming?  It is particularly evident that warming occurs when the sun is not shining (that would be night time temperatures, when black carbon does not absorb light).
Posted by: midwifetoad on July 29 2011,13:43

Soot = asphalt and black roofs. Interesting.

Asphalt pavement has an albedo in the same range as a conifer forest.

< http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Albedo#Black_carbon >
Posted by: JohnW on July 29 2011,14:00

Quote (Tracy P. Hamilton @ July 29 2011,11:41)
It is particularly evident that warming occurs when the sun is not shining (that would be night time temperatures, when black carbon does not absorb light).
---------------------QUOTE-------------------


Joe's probably aware of that, given that his argument is pulled from where the sun don't shine.
Posted by: Henry J on July 29 2011,14:44



---------------------QUOTE-------------------
given that his argument
---------------------QUOTE-------------------


What argument?
Posted by: JohnW on July 29 2011,15:39

Quote (Henry J @ July 29 2011,12:44)


---------------------QUOTE-------------------
given that his argument
---------------------QUOTE-------------------


What argument?
---------------------QUOTE-------------------


Fair point.
Posted by: OgreMkV on July 29 2011,18:35

BTW: Joe, here's a peer reviewed paper published in Science.

Here's the abstract:


---------------------QUOTE-------------------

Changes in outgoing radiation are both a consequence and a cause of changes in the earth’s temperature. Spencer and Braswell recently showed that in a simple box model for the earth the regression of outgoing radiation against surface temperature gave a slope that differed from the model’s true feedback parameter. They went on to select input parameters for the box model based on observations, computed the difference for those conditions, and asserted that there is a significant bias for climate studies. This paper shows that Spencer and Braswell overestimated the difference. Differences between the regression slope and the true feedback parameter are significantly reduced when 1) a more realistic value for the ocean mixed layer depth is used, 2) a corrected standard deviation of outgoing radiation is used, and 3) the model temperature variability is computed over the same time interval as the observations. When all three changes are made, the difference between the slope and feedback parameter is less than one-tenth of that estimated by Spencer and Braswell. Absolute values of the difference for realistic cases are less than 0.05 W/m^2/K, which is not significant for climate studies that employ regressions of outgoing radiation against temperature. Previously published results show that the difference is negligible in the Hadley Centre Slab Climate Model, version 3 (HadSM3).  (Murphy and Forster, 2010)

---------------------QUOTE-------------------


my emphasis

Wait, notice when this paper was published... 2010.  Yeah, everyone was aware that Spencer's work was flawed a year BEFORE Spencer's paper was published.

Oops.  nevermind.

Here's the link: < http://www.sciencemag.org/content/330/6010/1523.full >

Enjoy.
Posted by: Tracy P. Hamilton on July 30 2011,10:07

Joseph being an IDiot:

---------------------QUOTE-------------------
Joseph

07/29/2011

11:23 am

In typical fashion the alarmists are taking shots at Roy Spencer and not caring about the data.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------



Spencer's paper is about a simple 1-D model.  A boneheaded one that used unphysical parameters and overfitting.
Posted by: OgreMkV on July 30 2011,11:01

Quote (Tracy P. Hamilton @ July 30 2011,10:07)
Joseph being an IDiot:

---------------------QUOTE-------------------
Joseph

07/29/2011

11:23 am

In typical fashion the alarmists are taking shots at Roy Spencer and not caring about the data.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------



Spencer's paper is about a simple 1-D model.  A boneheaded one that used unphysical parameters and overfitting.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------


What's actually funny is that several prominent climate researchers found parts of Spencer's 1-d model interesting, useful, and raised some interesting questions.  They suggested revisions to the paper which is why it was published (after over a year of revisions).

Which explains why research showing Spencer is wrong came out BEFORE Spencer's own paper was published.

Of course, people are looking at the data.  But if you read the stuff that Spencer has written, his 'model' takes four variables and adjusts them to fit the data collected by satellite.

Unfortunately, if you use his calculated numbers, the temperature a million years ago was something like 1 trillion degrees below zero.

Further, he uses unrealistic numbers.  He calculated the mixing depth of the ocean at 700 meters.  Of course, that completely ignores the simple fact that much of the ocean DOESN'T mix at that depth.  Both Joe and Spencer need to look up 'thermocline' and explain why a layer where the water temperature rapidly changes by several degrees exists at between 50-100 meters... when the ocean should be perfectly mixed all the way to 700 meters.

There are many, many problems with Spencer's work and it has been cataloged quite effectively by the scientists who do such things.  

Heck, several other people recreated his work and then tried to make it better.  It just doesn't work.  If you fit the curves now, then the historical curves do not match what actually happened in history.  If you fit larger sections of the curve with your four variables, then you get obviously wrong results (like the temperature in 75 years will be -300 degree C.)

But Joe and Spencer are too busy looking for ideologies that support them instead of looking for data and results that are actually correct.
Posted by: guthrie on Aug. 01 2011,07:40

Quote (Tracy P. Hamilton @ July 29 2011,13:41)
Quote (Joe G @ July 29 2011,12:26)
 
Quote (OgreMkV @ July 28 2011,22:46)
JoeG is a global warming denier to.  His favorite player in that arena... Spencer.

Nevermind.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------


Kevin, As usual you are lying. I do not deny the earth is warming and even posted that on your blog.

I do say it is a good thing and I also say that soot, not CO2, is responsible for melting glaciers and ice-packs.

Look it up- soot and global warming- or just continue to be a little lying faggot. Your choice...
---------------------QUOTE-------------------



What makes you think that soot warming means that increasing CO2 does not also cause warming?  It is particularly evident that warming occurs when the sun is not shining (that would be night time temperatures, when black carbon does not absorb light).
---------------------QUOTE-------------------


Also the cooling stratosphere, which wouldn't be happening if warming was from more soot.
Posted by: OgreMkV on Aug. 03 2011,11:02

Comments from actual climate scientists about Spencer's new paper

< http://thinkprogress.org/romm....spencer >



---------------------QUOTE-------------------

As the famous critique goes, “Your manuscript is both good and original. But the part that is good is not original, and the part that is original is not good”:

1.“He’s taken an incorrect model, he’s tweaked it to match observations, but the conclusions you get from that are not correct,” Andrew Dessler, a professor of atmospheric sciences at Texas A&M University.
2.“It is not newsworthy,” Daniel Murphy, a National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) cloud researcher, wrote in an email to LiveScience.
3.NCAR’s Kevin Trenberth in an email:  “I have read the paper. I can not believe it got published. Maybe it got through because it is not in a journal that deals with atmospheric science much?”
4.Trenberth and John Fasullo at RealClimate:  “The bottom line is that there is NO merit whatsoever in this paper.”

---------------------QUOTE-------------------



The whole blog post linked to above for further refutations of Spencer's 'work'*.


*I use the term 'work' instead of the proper description "the creation of a flight of fancy that manages to match current data while making non-current predictions that are physically impossible".
Posted by: Tracy P. Hamilton on Sep. 04 2011,14:00

Expelled!  or something:

< http://www.evolutionnews.org/2011....81.html >



---------------------QUOTE-------------------
Just in case you were thinking that ID is the only subject on which Big Science tolerates no dissent, the editor-in-chief of Remoting Sensing has just resigned. His crime? Allowing a seminal article by Roy Spencer and William Braswell to be published. Shades of Sternberg. The paper has gotten a good bit of media attention, for an obvious reason: they show that one of the feedbacks that the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change has been treating as a positive feedback is really a negative feedback. In other words, rather than magnifying the effects of global warming due to extra atmospheric CO2, it counteracts it.

In resigning, the editor, Wolfgang Wagner, mentions absolutely no error in the paper. Essentially he says that "various internet discussion fora" have been on fire attacking the paper, he shouldn't have allowed it to be published, even though it went through (by his own admission) the proper peer-review channels, and even though he can't cite a single error in the paper. The forces of darkness may have overplayed their hand on this one. Spencer has challenged anyone who finds any error in the paper to submit a peer-reviewed article making the case.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------



Either they are unaware of Dessler's upcoming rebunking, or are lying by omission.  Let me spoil the surprise ending - Spencer is a crappy scientist.  I would argue, not a scientist at all anymore but a politician.



---------------------QUOTE-------------------
Nicholas, I would wager that my job has helped save our economy from the economic ravages of out-of-control environmental extremism.

I view my job a little like a legislator, supported by the taxpayer, to protect the interests of the taxpayer and to minimize the role of government.

If I and others are ultimately successful, it may well be that my job is no longer needed. Well then, that is progress. There are other things I can do.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------


Posted by: dhogaza on Sep. 04 2011,15:19

That bald admission by Spencer is a beautiful thing and I'm glad it got copied here.  It's been making the rounds for some time and it needs to be repeated whenever Spencer's name comes up.

Of course, the denialsphere loves it.  They're convinced that  mainstream climate science is a worldwide conspiracy of left-wing scientists who are just making shit up for political reasons.  So Spencer baldly stating that this is what he's doing but from the perspective of the right wing makes him a hero.  And an honest hero, unlike those lying scum mainstream climate scientists who aren't even honest enough to admit that all of mainstream climate science is a left wing-driven fraud.

Seriously.  That's how they think.  And in the case of Rick Perry, campaign for President.
Posted by: OgreMkV on Sep. 07 2011,07:47

The editor who allowed Spencer's paper to be published has stated that has become convinced that allowing the paper to be published was a bad idea and is stepping down.

< http://www.mdpi.com/2072-42....002 >

Unfortunately, I think we need him right where he is.  Someone who can look critically at his own work, realize potential mistakes, admit to them, and make an effort to correct them...

unlike some others around here.
Posted by: MichaelJ on Sep. 08 2011,22:53

AGW denial is different to Evolution denial because we can track the changes to the climate.
Given that the rural conservatives and large ag businesses have the most to lose through climate change  will we reach a point where they tell their denial leaders to fuck off.

They can hardly asked for subsidies to manage the effects of climate change if the GOP denies it exists.
Posted by: OgreMkV on Sep. 09 2011,07:26

Quote (MichaelJ @ Sep. 08 2011,22:53)
AGW denial is different to Evolution denial because we can track the changes to the climate.
Given that the rural conservatives and large ag businesses have the most to lose through climate change  will we reach a point where they tell their denial leaders to fuck off.

They can hardly asked for subsidies to manage the effects of climate change if the GOP denies it exists.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------


You're so cute when your naive :)

Rick Perry, as we speak, is trying to get FEMA money for Texas, even after cutting fire defense budgets AND telling the government that FEMA was a waste of time and money because the states can handle it without the interference of the Feds.

Denial is denial.  Politics is politics.  Money is money.  Logic and sense be damned when politicians are talking and money is on the table.
Posted by: MichaelJ on Sep. 09 2011,18:22

Quote (OgreMkV @ Sep. 09 2011,22:26)
Quote (MichaelJ @ Sep. 08 2011,22:53)
AGW denial is different to Evolution denial because we can track the changes to the climate.
Given that the rural conservatives and large ag businesses have the most to lose through climate change  will we reach a point where they tell their denial leaders to fuck off.

They can hardly asked for subsidies to manage the effects of climate change if the GOP denies it exists.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------


You're so cute when your naive :)

Rick Perry, as we speak, is trying to get FEMA money for Texas, even after cutting fire defense budgets AND telling the government that FEMA was a waste of time and money because the states can handle it without the interference of the Feds.

Denial is denial.  Politics is politics.  Money is money.  Logic and sense be damned when politicians are talking and money is on the table.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------


No I agree that leaders will only change if they are in danger of losing an election if they don't change. This happened in Australia about a decade ago when the Prime Minister was a denialist and suddenly found out that 75% of Aussies believed in climate change.

I was talking about the great unwashed masses and some not so small agri concerns. Your farm could end up totally uneconomic due to climate change. As usually happens the government steps in to subsidise changes in land use. Now the GOP has painted itself into a corner and can't subsidise the effects of something they don't believe exists. So I wonder if the farm towns will start voting for candidates that believe in AGW.
Posted by: Tracy P. Hamilton on Sep. 20 2011,12:58

DeNews!

About an article headlined in New Scientist "Times Atlas grossly exaggerates Greenland ice loss "



---------------------QUOTE-------------------
In a good cause. Just like fake miracles conveniently timed for a crusade.

What fascinates ID types about the global warming controversy is that it is pseudoscience mushrooming over a short period before collapsing, instead of a long period before petering out.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------



Daayum, ID types are stupid!  Times Atlas =/= claiming to do science, therefore it can't be pseudoscience.  Somebody who was not an expert made a goof.  Here is a Real Scientist (not an IDiot):



---------------------QUOTE-------------------
Ted Scambos, the NSIDC's expert on the Greenland ice sheet, says neither he nor his colleagues were consulted in person. "Graduate students would not have made a mistake like this," he told New Scientist.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------


Posted by: Tracy P. Hamilton on Sep. 28 2011,11:06



---------------------QUOTE-------------------
Climate change controversy: It takes a long time to turn a great ship around, but eventually …
---------------------QUOTE-------------------





---------------------QUOTE-------------------
In “Climate skeptics don’t ‘deny science’” (Townhall , September 27, 2011), commentator Jeff Jacoby chronicles that the ship may indeed be turning.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------



Jeff Jacoby, lead scientist for the Boston Globe.  Oh wait, ignorant opinion columnist.  So easy to get the two confused, DeNews!
Posted by: MichaelJ on Sep. 28 2011,16:13

I'm sure that they'll mention the shrinkage in the artic ice sheet this year
Posted by: Tracy P. Hamilton on Oct. 04 2011,11:36

From the same bozos who brought us the "documentary" Expelled, No Intelligence Allowed, comes...



---------------------QUOTE-------------------
An Albuquerque-based filmmaker called Mark Mathis has produced a film called Spoiled, which promises to expose the “outright lies” being spread about oil by “the media, politicians and environmental activists”. Mathis says it’s now time to “fill up on the truth”.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------





---------------------QUOTE-------------------
The only clue to the film’s deeper content and arguments is the trailer that is currently posted on the film’s website. The viewer is introduced to half a dozen or so (unlabelled) talking heads, including Senator James Inhofe, all of which help to feed into the film’s central premise of why we need “an open and honest discussion about energy”. (The film’s co-writer Kevin Miller also talks about the film on an Atlanta-based Christian TV station.)
---------------------QUOTE-------------------



All Science So Far!
Posted by: OgreMkV on Oct. 04 2011,17:32

Quote (Tracy P. Hamilton @ Oct. 04 2011,11:36)
From the same bozos who brought us the "documentary" Expelled, No Intelligence Allowed, comes...



---------------------QUOTE-------------------
An Albuquerque-based filmmaker called Mark Mathis has produced a film called Spoiled, which promises to expose the “outright lies” being spread about oil by “the media, politicians and environmental activists”. Mathis says it’s now time to “fill up on the truth”.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------





---------------------QUOTE-------------------
The only clue to the film’s deeper content and arguments is the trailer that is currently posted on the film’s website. The viewer is introduced to half a dozen or so (unlabelled) talking heads, including Senator James Inhofe, all of which help to feed into the film’s central premise of why we need “an open and honest discussion about energy”. (The film’s co-writer Kevin Miller also talks about the film on an Atlanta-based Christian TV station.)
---------------------QUOTE-------------------



All Science So Far!
---------------------QUOTE-------------------


An open an honest discussion about energy:

"We can get all of our energy needs without pollutants."

"But, then the rich people won't be able to afford to buy more senators."

"QED."
Posted by: OgreMkV on Oct. 06 2011,07:11

Quote (forastero @ Oct. 06 2011,00:13)
Quote (Trubble @ July 15 2011,14:26)
Thanks, Louis. My original question has been adequately answered, by several people including yourself. I think the "denier" label is sometimes applied to people who I don't think are denying the reality or seriousness of climate change, only going against the mainstream on some of the details or suggested solutions. I think that tactic is counter-productive. But no one here seems to support it, which is good.

My "sticking point" now is that I don't appreciate being accused of having some kind of dishonest agenda, or of being a "dumb sumbitch" too lazy or stupid to use Google. I said earlier I'd go back to lurking, because I don't enjoy this kind of exchange ("Jane, you ignorant slut..."), but I guess I've been sucked in now.

Anyway, my main interest is in exploring the disconnect between the scientific consensus and the public policy side. I think there are a lot of reasons why the general public is still skeptical, and some (not all) of those reasons relate to the way the scientific community overall is handling the issue. This is a teaching moment, and when a student isn't getting it, it's the teacher's responsibility to find a way to get through.

My profession is communications, so crafting messages so they'll resonate with a target audience is something I know a little about. Hence my orientation to this.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------



Trouble...I dont think its so much the warnings over climate change and/or deforestation that makes them skeptical but rather the femicrat’s use of Co2 levels toward population control.
Why do the likes of Bill Gates, Al Gore, the United Nations etc.. always focus blame on African and Latin American populations, deforestations, dust ect…when African and Latin American ecology is way better than United Nation's ecology? Why is that the United Nations allows epidemics like typhus and malaria in Africa and Latin America but wipes them out only in lands that they occupy?   Is it because they want this land for themselves? Yeah these radical femicrats also deny good stewardship because their religion tells them that their mother-nature selection will “always” evolve better without mankind. But that idea is now literally going up in smoke. Indigenous  agroforesters  knew better and were fantastic stewards from British Columbia to Amazonia. Unfortunately, most of this indigenous knowledge was wiped out and/or suppressed by so called progressives and finally forgotten after years of progressive handouts.


< http://www.prisonplanet.com/nasa-gl....de.html >
[URL=http://thetruthwins.com/archives/to-the-global-elite-the-math-is-simple-human-overpopulation-is-causing-climate-change-so-t

he-solution-to-climate-change-is-population-control]http://thetruthwins.com/archive....control[/URL]
< http://www.peopleforlife.org/gore.ht....re.html >
< http://saynsumthn.wordpress.com/2011.......control >
< http://www.humanevents.com/article....d=26220 >
< http://www.christianexaminer.com/Art..._....08.html >
< http://www.blackgenocide.org/sanger0....03.html >
< http://www.freerepublic.com/focus......s....ts >
< http://www.aei.org/issue......e....47 >
< http://thetruthwins.com/archive....control >
< http://www.winonadailynews.com/news.......86.html >
< http://www.prisonplanet.com/nasa-gl....de.html >
< http://www.21stcenturysciencetech.com/article....on.html >  
< http://www.lifesite.net/ldn........6a.html >
< http://www.lifesite.net/ldn........09.html >
< http://www.lifesite.net/ldn........7a.html >
< http://www.lifesite.net/ldn........01.html >
< http://www.lifesite.net/ldn........01.html >
< http://newsbusters.org/node.......e....69 >
---------------------QUOTE-------------------


I think I speak for everyone when I say...

WTF??!??!!
Posted by: Louis on Oct. 06 2011,09:20

Quote (OgreMkV @ Oct. 06 2011,13:11)
[SNIP]

I think I speak for everyone when I say...

WTF??!??!!
---------------------QUOTE-------------------


Indeed. Crocoducks on the other thread, evil wicked OH NOES TEH EVILUSHUNIZMS IZ AN RELIGION KILLING TWEES on this one.

So, what's the betting? Have we got a standard bright meteorite, briefly flaring into our atmosphere, or do we have a long period comet, eventually to become a satellite?

I'm betting passive-aggressive whiner who cuts and pastes and has the reasoning ability of a block of warm dung, who'll briefly flare up then die off in a puff of abuse. Maybe I'm wrong, but I do like the strong start of whack-a-doodlery.

Louis
Posted by: JohnW on Oct. 06 2011,10:19

Quote (forastero @ Oct. 05 2011,22:13)
Trouble...I dont think its so much the warnings over climate change and/or deforestation that makes them skeptical but rather the femicrat’s use of Co2 levels toward population control.
Why do the likes of Bill Gates, Al Gore, the United Nations etc.. always focus blame on African and Latin American populations, deforestations, dust ect…when African and Latin American ecology is way better than United Nation's ecology? Why is that the United Nations allows epidemics like typhus and malaria in Africa and Latin America but wipes them out only in lands that they occupy?   Is it because they want this land for themselves? Yeah these radical femicrats also deny good stewardship because their religion tells them that their mother-nature selection will “always” evolve better without mankind. But that idea is now literally going up in smoke. Indigenous  agroforesters  knew better and were fantastic stewards from British Columbia to Amazonia. Unfortunately, most of this indigenous knowledge was wiped out and/or suppressed by so called progressives and finally forgotten after years of progressive handouts.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------


United Nations?  Stooges!

Everyone knows it's the Welsh who are running everything.  Just ask Louis.
Posted by: Louis on Oct. 06 2011,10:45

Quote (JohnW @ Oct. 06 2011,16:19)
Quote (forastero @ Oct. 05 2011,22:13)
Trouble...I dont think its so much the warnings over climate change and/or deforestation that makes them skeptical but rather the femicrat’s use of Co2 levels toward population control.
Why do the likes of Bill Gates, Al Gore, the United Nations etc.. always focus blame on African and Latin American populations, deforestations, dust ect…when African and Latin American ecology is way better than United Nation's ecology? Why is that the United Nations allows epidemics like typhus and malaria in Africa and Latin America but wipes them out only in lands that they occupy?   Is it because they want this land for themselves? Yeah these radical femicrats also deny good stewardship because their religion tells them that their mother-nature selection will “always” evolve better without mankind. But that idea is now literally going up in smoke. Indigenous  agroforesters  knew better and were fantastic stewards from British Columbia to Amazonia. Unfortunately, most of this indigenous knowledge was wiped out and/or suppressed by so called progressives and finally forgotten after years of progressive handouts.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------


United Nations?  Stooges!

Everyone knows it's the Welsh who are running everything.  Just ask Louis.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------


Dirty Welsh bastards with their multiple consonants, close harmony singing, leeks, daffodils and horrendous molestation of perfectly innocent sheep.

It's a conspiracy between them and Colonel Sanders.

Louis
Posted by: khan on Oct. 06 2011,14:25

Quote (Louis @ Oct. 06 2011,10:20)
Quote (OgreMkV @ Oct. 06 2011,13:11)
[SNIP]

I think I speak for everyone when I say...

WTF??!??!!
---------------------QUOTE-------------------


Indeed. Crocoducks on the other thread, evil wicked OH NOES TEH EVILUSHUNIZMS IZ AN RELIGION KILLING TWEES on this one.

So, what's the betting? Have we got a standard bright meteorite, briefly flaring into our atmosphere, or do we have a long period comet, eventually to become a satellite?

I'm betting passive-aggressive whiner who cuts and pastes and has the reasoning ability of a block of warm dung, who'll briefly flare up then die off in a puff of abuse. Maybe I'm wrong, but I do like the strong start of whack-a-doodlery.

Louis
---------------------QUOTE-------------------


"Cleanup on aisle 4"
Posted by: Dr.GH on Oct. 07 2011,00:18

The spam links are a serious problem.  :angry:


Posted by: Kristine on Oct. 20 2011,12:45

It seems that I should not have warned Kevin Miller against promoting his other films (SpOILed) in the "Expelled" thread after all.

Global warming, Ben Stein's economics (in which he denied the possibility of any economic recession, right before it happened), and "Darwinism" seem to be connected, if one watches < Collapse >, in which Michael Ruppert describes how our presumed infinite-growth economy (a pyramid scheme, essentially) is being brought down by the depletion of the world's oil reserves (peak oil).

One thing that has always confused me about deniers is that they speak from the other side of their mouths and actually praise a warmer climate. DaveScot himself did it.

This makes sense if one accepts Ruppert's assertion that the melting of polar ice caps frees up Antarctica for drilling, since ANWAR would produce only 6 months of oil for 10 years' work, and even Saudi Arabia has turned to offshore drilling, an indication that even the Saudis can no longer profit from finding more land-based reserves of sweet crude.

So, there you have it folks: "deniers" are just stalling for time, because they want it to happen.

Ruppert spends some time outlining and connecting the "infinite growth paradigm," derivatives, compound interest (the understanding of which conservatives used to advocate just like gold shares, until derivatives and the housing bubble came along), the recession, the Arab Spring, the bankruptcy of California, and the population explosion with the production and consumption of oil. Whatever you think of his assertions, I recommend the documentary for this section alone.

With all the talk about a "paradigm shift" from ID advocates, Stein, Miller, Mathis, Ruloff, and others, you are not going to hear this from them.
Posted by: OgreMkV on Oct. 20 2011,12:58

If you like, I'll see if I can dig up the quote, but Saudi has admitted (quietly) that it can no longer supply the oil that the US needs on a day-to-day basis.

US industries are going to have to start kissing the asses of Argentina and (of course) Iraq to maintain the intake of oil that keeps are country going.

sigh...*

*I'm doing a lot of that today.  Doesn't help that my writing is going poorly.  Of course, it doesn't help that the writing standards I have are fundamentally wrong and scientifically inaccurate...
Posted by: Dr.GH on Oct. 20 2011,14:09

Glenn Morton has been pounding the 'peak oil" drum for years, and at the same time became a warming denier.

Oh well...
Posted by: Kristine on Oct. 31 2011,07:26

< Just follow where the evidence leads >.
Posted by: Henry J on Nov. 01 2011,10:06

Evidence? Evidence? We don't need no stinkin evidence!!111!!one!!!

(nyuk nyuk)
Posted by: MichaelJ on Nov. 01 2011,20:16

Quote (Kristine @ Oct. 31 2011,22:26)
< Just follow where the evidence leads >.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------


Science converting denialists one by one
Posted by: Tracy P. Hamilton on Nov. 02 2011,11:13

DeNews is IDiot, Dog bites Man:



---------------------QUOTE-------------------
Latest climate change scandal: Lead BEST study author accused of trying to mislead the public – by co-author
---------------------QUOTE-------------------



This would be a climate change skeptic scandal, DeNews!  

The source: the always accurate Daily Mail.
The accusation therein:  Author says climate change is occuring, but coauthor claims results show warming has recently stopped.
The result: this co-author has been asked to provide a statistical justification, with silence so far.  Yes, that is a real scandal DeNews.
Posted by: Dale_Husband on Nov. 05 2011,10:32

No forgiveness from me!

< http://dalehusband.wordpress.com/2011.......redited >


---------------------QUOTE-------------------



Climate “skeptic” attempting damage control after being discredited

It should have been obvious from the 1990s onward that global warming was indeed real and that human activities were chiefly to blame, but many who were entrenched in conservative or libertarian political positions found those conclusions offensive and a threat to their interests, hence the ever-present attacks by climate change “skeptics” who would do everything they could to cast doubt on the evidence regarding the issue. They did that instead of examining their political positions, which a true skeptic should have done!

Now one of them, Richard Muller, has changed sides, but is still trying to justify his earlier attitude. That’s an example of a “notpology“, which is dishonest.

< http://news.yahoo.com/skeptic....05.html >

 

---------------------QUOTE-------------------

WASHINGTON (AP) — A prominent physicist and skeptic of global warming spent two years trying to find out if mainstream climate scientists were wrong. In the end, he determined they were right: Temperatures really are rising rapidly.

The study of the world’s surface temperatures by Richard Muller was partially bankrolled by a foundation connected to global warming deniers. He pursued long-held skeptic theories in analyzing the data. He was spurred to action because of “Climategate,” a British scandal involving hacked emails of scientists.

<snip>

“The skeptics raised valid points and everybody should have been a skeptic two years ago,” Muller said in a telephone interview. “And now we have confidence that the temperature rise that had previously been reported had been done without bias.”

Muller said that he came into the study “with a proper skepticism,” something scientists “should always have. I was somewhat bothered by the fact that there was not enough skepticism” before.
 (Emphasis mine)
---------------------QUOTE-------------------



That is bullcrap. If Muller was wrong before, he was certainly wrong a decade ago, so why not just say that and leave his ego out of it? Scientists, including proponents of the man-made global warming hypothesis, have to be responsible skeptics to do their work at all and prove it by subjecting their findings to peer review, and it was the peer review process that made that hypothesis credible in the first place. Saying otherwise as Muller is doing is slander.

< http://www.dictionaryslang.com/notpolo....tpology >

 

---------------------QUOTE-------------------
An apology that doesnt ACTUALLY apologise, but is simply given to make the evil person LOOK/feel better.

---------------------QUOTE-------------------



---------------------QUOTE-------------------


Posted by: Kristine on Jan. 12 2012,12:43

< Ben Stein has officially become a virus >, but that does not resolve the question of whether or not viruses are alive. (With this evidence, probably not.) How can a lawsuit come from a non-lawsuit? Anyone? Anyone? ;) (Yes, my comment is there.)
Posted by: Tracy P. Hamilton on Feb. 10 2012,15:31

BullyA is as great a scientist as DeNews:



---------------------QUOTE-------------------
Yeti’s House is Safe
February 10, 2012 Posted by Barry Arrington under Intelligent Design
No Comments

Anyone remember how the UN panel assured us the Himalayan glaciers would melt completely in 25 years?

---------------------QUOTE-------------------




Um, no? I remember a mistake in a regional impacts report that was caught by glaciologists.



---------------------QUOTE-------------------
Now we know they are not melting at all.  Do you think all the climate alarmists are slapping their foreheads and yelling ”Doh!  Maybe I should reevaluate my position”?  Me neither.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------



Here is the abstract of the paper:


---------------------QUOTE-------------------
Glaciers and ice caps (GICs) are important contributors to present-day global mean sea level rise1, 2, 3, 4. Most previous global mass balance estimates for GICs rely on extrapolation of sparse mass balance measurements1, 2, 4 representing only a small fraction of the GIC area, leaving their overall contribution to sea level rise unclear. Here we show that GICs, excluding the Greenland and Antarctic peripheral GICs, lost mass at a rate of 148?±?30?Gt?yr?1 from January 2003 to December 2010, contributing 0.41?±?0.08?mm?yr?1 to sea level rise. Our results are based on a global, simultaneous inversion of monthly GRACE-derived satellite gravity fields, from which we calculate the mass change over all ice-covered regions greater in area than 100?km2. The GIC rate for 2003–2010 is about 30 per cent smaller than the previous mass balance estimate that most closely matches our study period2. The high mountains of Asia, in particular, show a mass loss of only 4?±?20?Gt?yr?1 for 2003–2010, compared with 47–55?Gt?yr?1 in previously published estimates2, 5. For completeness, we also estimate that the Greenland and Antarctic ice sheets, including their peripheral GICs, contributed 1.06?±?0.19?mm?yr?1 to sea level rise over the same time period. The total contribution to sea level rise from all ice-covered regions is thus 1.48?±?0.26?mm??1, which agrees well with independent estimates of sea level rise originating from land ice loss and other terrestrial sources6.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------



Perhaps BullyA should reconsider what this is telling him - the globe is warming, ice is melting.  Of course, being Faux News, they are only concerned with the 1% of glaciers not melting.  :angry:
Posted by: fnxtr on Feb. 11 2012,03:46

Quote (OgreMkV @ Oct. 20 2011,10:58)
If you like, I'll see if I can dig up the quote, but Saudi has admitted (quietly) that it can no longer supply the oil that the US needs on a day-to-day basis.

US industries are going to have to start kissing the asses of Argentina and (of course) Iraq to maintain the intake of oil that keeps are country going.

sigh...*

*I'm doing a lot of that today.  Doesn't help that my writing is going poorly.  Of course, it doesn't help that the writing standards I have are fundamentally wrong and scientifically inaccurate...
---------------------QUOTE-------------------


"Uh-oh."  -- Canada.
Posted by: Tracy P. Hamilton on Feb. 11 2012,10:37

Quote (fnxtr @ Feb. 11 2012,03:46)
Quote (OgreMkV @ Oct. 20 2011,10:58)
If you like, I'll see if I can dig up the quote, but Saudi has admitted (quietly) that it can no longer supply the oil that the US needs on a day-to-day basis.

US industries are going to have to start kissing the asses of Argentina and (of course) Iraq to maintain the intake of oil that keeps are country going.

sigh...*

*I'm doing a lot of that today.  Doesn't help that my writing is going poorly.  Of course, it doesn't help that the writing standards I have are fundamentally wrong and scientifically inaccurate...
---------------------QUOTE-------------------


"Uh-oh."  -- Canada.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------


"I, for one, welcome our US Overlords."
Posted by: Tracy P. Hamilton on Feb. 11 2012,17:31

Joe makes excuses for the melting ice:



---------------------QUOTE-------------------
Soot and dirt melt ice well before the ambient temperature is above freezing.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------



Because we all know there was no soot or dirt before the CO2 just coincidentally started to mysteriously rise, coming from nowhere.
Posted by: OgreMkV on Feb. 11 2012,23:07

Quote (Tracy P. Hamilton @ Feb. 11 2012,17:31)
Joe makes excuses for the melting ice:



---------------------QUOTE-------------------
Soot and dirt melt ice well before the ambient temperature is above freezing.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------



Because we all know there was no soot or dirt before the CO2 just coincidentally started to mysteriously rise, coming from nowhere.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------


Joe still has a lot of misconceptions about global warming.  I know he's been exposed to reality because he's like 30% of the hits on my blog.
Posted by: Texas Teach on Feb. 12 2012,09:52

Quote (OgreMkV @ Feb. 11 2012,23:07)
Quote (Tracy P. Hamilton @ Feb. 11 2012,17:31)
Joe makes excuses for the melting ice:

 

---------------------QUOTE-------------------
Soot and dirt melt ice well before the ambient temperature is above freezing.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------



Because we all know there was no soot or dirt before the CO2 just coincidentally started to mysteriously rise, coming from nowhere.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------


Joe still has a lot of misconceptions about global warming.  I know he's been exposed to reality because he's like 30% of the hits on my blog.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------


Morton's Demon has helpfully equipped Joe with a pair of Joo Janta 200 Super-Chromatic Peril Sensitive Sunglasses which darken at the first hint of reality exposure.
Posted by: Kristine on May 15 2012,08:22

< Har har de har, Ben Stein! Emoshunal Deestress! Oh Noes! >


---------------------QUOTE-------------------
A judge has dismissed most of Ben Stein's lawsuit that claimed the Japanese company Kyocera Mita backed out of a $300,000 deal to hire him to act in commercials for a line of computer printers after it found out about his controversial beliefs on global warming.

Although Stein claimed that his freedom to speak publicly was at stake, California Superior Court Judge Elizabeth Allen White has ruled that much of his lawsuit itself was a legal maneuver intended to impinge free speech and has dismissed eight of Stein's nine claims. The lawsuit survives, but only barely.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------



Obviously a not very fit lawsuit. How does a lawsuit come from a non-lawsuit, anyway? ;)
Posted by: fnxtr on May 15 2012,08:38

Quote (Kristine @ May 15 2012,06:22)
< Har har de har, Ben Stein! Emoshunal Deestress! Oh Noes! >
 

---------------------QUOTE-------------------
A judge has dismissed most of Ben Stein's lawsuit that claimed the Japanese company Kyocera Mita backed out of a $300,000 deal to hire him to act in commercials for a line of computer printers after it found out about his controversial beliefs on global warming.

Although Stein claimed that his freedom to speak publicly was at stake, California Superior Court Judge Elizabeth Allen White has ruled that much of his lawsuit itself was a legal maneuver intended to impinge free speech and has dismissed eight of Stein's nine claims. The lawsuit survives, but only barely.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------



Obviously a not very fit lawsuit. How does a lawsuit come from a non-lawsuit, anyway? ;)
---------------------QUOTE-------------------


Descent with modification.
Posted by: OgreMkV on May 15 2012,08:46

Quote (Kristine @ May 15 2012,08:22)
< Har har de har, Ben Stein! Emoshunal Deestress! Oh Noes! >
 

---------------------QUOTE-------------------
A judge has dismissed most of Ben Stein's lawsuit that claimed the Japanese company Kyocera Mita backed out of a $300,000 deal to hire him to act in commercials for a line of computer printers after it found out about his controversial beliefs on global warming.

Although Stein claimed that his freedom to speak publicly was at stake, California Superior Court Judge Elizabeth Allen White has ruled that much of his lawsuit itself was a legal maneuver intended to impinge free speech and has dismissed eight of Stein's nine claims. The lawsuit survives, but only barely.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------



Obviously a not very fit lawsuit. How does a lawsuit come from a non-lawsuit, anyway? ;)
---------------------QUOTE-------------------


One of Kyocera's business units is manufacturing advanced solar panels.

Their panels will be an option on the nextgen Prius.  That business unit has invested more than half a billion dollars in solar panel manufacturing plants... including on in San Diego to meet the US desire for clean power.

Makes sense to drop Ben Stein to me.
Posted by: Henry J on May 15 2012,13:02

So he thinks (?) that freedom of speech obligates employers to hire people who would embarrass them in front of their customers?
Posted by: Kristine on May 15 2012,14:53

Quote (Henry J @ May 15 2012,13:02)
So he thinks (?) that freedom of speech obligates employers to hire people who would embarrass them in front of their customers?
---------------------QUOTE-------------------


Well, apparently he's willing to do to others what he's already done to himself. ;) Isn't that the Golden Shower Rule?

I think he was going for the See-I'm-A-Skepptik-BuddI-DriveAPrius emotional blackmail, or he was really, really counting on singing "Big in Japan" over a montage of Occupy students protesting high loan debt.
Posted by: fnxtr on May 15 2012,19:46

Quote (Kristine @ May 15 2012,12:53)
I think he was going for the See-I'm-A-Skepptik-BuddI-DriveAPrius emotional blackmail, or he was really, really counting on singing "Big in Japan" over a montage of Occupy students protesting high loan debt.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------


Thanks for that CITR-FM flashback. I must now go to YouTube.
Posted by: Tracy P. Hamilton on Sep. 11 2012,14:00

Denialist follies:

So this psychology professor at Univ of West Australia does a survey to see if belief in global warming conspiracy theories is correlated with other conspiracy theories which are not climate related in any way.  Short answer: yes.  Long answer: hell, yes!

< http://www.shapingtomorrowsworld.org/ccc1.ht....c1.html >

Commenter make accusations that he lied about contacting skeptic blogs to post a link to the surveys, in order to get the answer he wanted.  Demonstrating the very conspiracist ideation that they are offended by being linked to!

Subsequent posts continue the fun:

< http://www.shapingtomorrowsworld.org/ccc2.ht....c2.html > "It has come to my attention that one of the individuals who initially denied—yes, folks, that's the correct word, look it up in a dictionary—having received an invitation to post a link to my survey on the rejection of science on his blog, has now found that email."

< http://www.shapingtomorrowsworld.org/lewando....e1.html > "The public response to my forthcoming paper in Psychological Science, entitled "NASA faked the moon landing—Therefore (Climate) Science is a Hoax: An Anatomy of the Motivated Rejection of Science," has provided a perfect real-life illustration of the very cognitive processes at the center of my research.

In fact, the cascading eruption of allegations and theories about the paper and myself have illustrated the impoverished epistemology of climate denial better than any mountain of data could have done."

< http://www.shapingtomorrowsworld.org/lewando....te.html >

< http://www.shapingtomorrowsworld.org/lewando....f4.html >

What a bunch of dumbasses!
Posted by: midwifetoad on Sep. 11 2012,15:33

I've watched this debate from several perspectives, and I'm convinced it isn't at all the same as the general anti-science, religious fundamentalist anti-science response.

I don't think it's even about money in the usual sense.

First of all, technological luddism is not typically a conservative thing. Conservatives may object to science when it targets specific religious beliefs, but they are generally happy with technology.

I think even the oil companies would be more than happy to enter alternative energy markets if opportunities really existed.

I think the problem is that good alternatives simply don't exist.

Before that claim is summarily dismissed I would like to point out that manufacture of wind and thermal generators depends on rare earth elements that are really messy to produce, The United States has simply banned all the mining technologies needed to produce the materials needed for high efficiency magnets. China produces the raw materials, but at a horrendous environmental and human cost.

I am not fully up to speed on solar electric, but it does not seem like a mature technology. The one big effort in the United States went bankrupt.

Batteries are still not a mature technology.

The only proven technology that could quickly replace coal and oil is nuclear, and the Japanese tsunami seems to have set that prospect back about thirty years.

So the political opposition to AGW amelioration seems to be motivated by a lack of alternatives that would not induce a massive global recession. If there were some mature technology that simply required lots of labor and investment, I think we would see support. Unfortunately, the only real solutions all seem to call for making people poorer.
Posted by: OgreMkV on Sep. 11 2012,15:45

Quote (midwifetoad @ Sep. 11 2012,15:33)
I've watched this debate from several perspectives, and I'm convinced it isn't at all the same as the general anti-science, religious fundamentalist anti-science response.

I don't think it's even about money in the usual sense.

First of all, technological luddism is not typically a conservative thing. Conservatives may object to science when it targets specific religious beliefs, but they are generally happy with technology.

I think even the oil companies would be more than happy to enter alternative energy markets if opportunities really existed.

I think the problem is that good alternatives simply don't exist.

Before that claim is summarily dismissed I would like to point out that manufacture of wind and thermal generators depends on rare earth elements that are really messy to produce, The United States has simply banned all the mining technologies needed to produce the materials needed for high efficiency magnets. China produces the raw materials, but at a horrendous environmental and human cost.

I am not fully up to speed on solar electric, but it does not seem like a mature technology. The one big effort in the United States went bankrupt.

Batteries are still not a mature technology.

The only proven technology that could quickly replace coal and oil is nuclear, and the Japanese tsunami seems to have set that prospect back about thirty years.

So the political opposition to AGW amelioration seems to be motivated by a lack of alternatives that would not induce a massive global recession. If there were some mature technology that simply required lots of labor and investment, I think we would see support. Unfortunately, the only real solutions all seem to call for making people poorer.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------


I disagree.  We have a solar PV station going in down the street.  It's going to be a 30 Megawatt system.  Yeah, not much, but it's a start.  Texas generates something like 10% of its total electricity needs from wind.

There are production solar thermal stations going up in Spain as well.  That one is particularly interesting, but solar mirrors melt a chemical salt, which boils water.  The system can run at full power for up to 14 hours without sunlight... meaning it works at night.  It can store the heat energy for like 3 days without boiling water for electricity.

My understanding is that wind is fully competitive with coal and natural gas... without the fossil fuel subsidies.  If they subsidies are not included, wind beats fossil fuels, solar is about 5 cents more than fossil fuels, and nuclear is roughly equivalent.  With the subsidies in place, fossil beats them all... of course, the subsidies really shouldn't count, since we're paying for that too... just as taxes instead of electricity costs.

Think about it.  Major oil companies are getting 10 billion dollars a year from the government AND bringing in record profits.  If they spend their subsidy money on politicians, then they get to keep every dime of the income and still control the entire debate.

Here's some more.  http://ogremk5.wordpress.com/2011/03/25/renewable-energy-and-the-economy/

And companies are getting involved in clean energy.
Posted by: Tracy P. Hamilton on Sep. 11 2012,17:03

Quote (midwifetoad @ Sep. 11 2012,15:33)
I've watched this debate from several perspectives, and I'm convinced it isn't at all the same as the general anti-science, religious fundamentalist anti-science response.

I don't think it's even about money in the usual sense.

First of all, technological luddism is not typically a conservative thing. Conservatives may object to science when it targets specific religious beliefs, but they are generally happy with technology.

I think even the oil companies would be more than happy to enter alternative energy markets if opportunities really existed.

I think the problem is that good alternatives simply don't exist.

Before that claim is summarily dismissed I would like to point out that manufacture of wind and thermal generators depends on rare earth elements that are really messy to produce, The United States has simply banned all the mining technologies needed to produce the materials needed for high efficiency magnets. China produces the raw materials, but at a horrendous environmental and human cost.

I am not fully up to speed on solar electric, but it does not seem like a mature technology. The one big effort in the United States went bankrupt.

Batteries are still not a mature technology.

The only proven technology that could quickly replace coal and oil is nuclear, and the Japanese tsunami seems to have set that prospect back about thirty years.

So the political opposition to AGW amelioration seems to be motivated by a lack of alternatives that would not induce a massive global recession. If there were some mature technology that simply required lots of labor and investment, I think we would see support. Unfortunately, the only real solutions all seem to call for making people poorer.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------


Good alternatives do exist (all energy sources,and conservation (designer forbid), yet require significant up front costs and need widespread implementation to achieve economy of scale.  I think the ultimate limit on scale is raw materials, as you point out.  

The motivation for the science rejection is two-fold: businesses with immediate profit motive opposing regulation, and the victims who are led to believe that government solutions are always worse than free market solutions - even if the government allows the free market to include costs and not externalize them.
Posted by: midwifetoad on Sep. 11 2012,17:28

What alternatives? I'd like to see some numbers and time lines. There are costs associated with manufacturing the alternatives.
Posted by: Erasmus, FCD on Sep. 11 2012,18:11

seems like first it would be necessary to specify a particular grid configuration because that very much constrains the other possibilities
Posted by: OgreMkV on Sep. 11 2012,18:27

Quote (midwifetoad @ Sep. 11 2012,17:28)
What alternatives? I'd like to see some numbers and time lines. There are costs associated with manufacturing the alternatives.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------


And there are costs with building coal and fossil plants... one of the largest of which is pumping more CO2 into the atmosphere.

Look at the links in my blog.  One of them includes lifetime costs of multiple generation systems.

Here, I've done the research for you... or at least found it.
< http://www.eia.gov/forecas....ion.cfm >

According to the above, the levelized cost for wind is already better than coal.

In fact, wind and hydro are both better than all fossil fuels except combined cycle natural gas.  

Yeah solar isn't there yet.  Still, companies are building solar panels and solar thermal plants.

The costs above don't include things like pollution clean up and defense against sea-level rise.  I also see no mention of subsidies in any form in the above.

As far as timelines, again wind is available now.  I could live with nuclear, but there's no new nuclear plants being built.  It doesn't look like there's any chance of a new one being built.  It's not money (well, it is a little), it's politics.  Anyone suggesting nuclear plants right now is dead meat.

A wind farm can be put up in months to a year.  Plus it can start generating electricity as soon as the first turbine goes up.  Only solar and wind can do that.  All the others have to be completely built first.  

Anyway, there's a lot to support it.  Cost, no pollution, no fuel, etc.  OK, there's some pollution during manufacturing, but there's some pollution when building an iphone too, no one is complaining about that.  At least one company claims to have designed a more efficient turbine with permanent magnets, but I haven't seen test data for it, so I wouldn't put money either way.
Posted by: midwifetoad on Sep. 11 2012,18:46

Every technology seems to have its enemies. Wind turbines are ugly and kill birds. Everyone wants them but not nearby.

Personally I'm interested in thorium. China seems to be going in that direction. I assume we'll be buying their reactors in ten years.

My point is that opposition to solutions comes from so many directions. I don't think it coincides with the antievolution crowd.
Posted by: OgreMkV on Sep. 11 2012,19:26

Quote (midwifetoad @ Sep. 11 2012,18:46)
Every technology seems to have its enemies. Wind turbines are ugly and kill birds. Everyone wants them but not nearby.

Personally I'm interested in thorium. China seems to be going in that direction. I assume we'll be buying their reactors in ten years.

My point is that opposition to solutions comes from so many directions. I don't think it coincides with the antievolution crowd.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------


No, the opposition to clean tech comes from oil companies.  And it's not that it's because they don't have a piece of the pie.  I have heard, but not confirmed, that at least one biofuel company was bought by a major oil company and then shut down.

As to the bird kills, every research article I can find on that subject points to one site, using old turbines that spin a higher rates of speed, causing a FEW bird deaths.  According to the report, cats killed more birds in the US than wind turbines.  http://dels.nas.edu/Report/Environmental-Impacts-Wind-Energy-Projects/11935

Thorium is a neat tech, if it works.  The problem, again, isn't so much technology as political will.  It can take 8 years or more to get a new plant approved, then another 4 years or so to build the facility.

Basically, the cost to build one 3 gigawatt nuclear plant (not Thorium), would build almost 10 gigawatts of wind power.  even assuming a 25% availability factor, the wind still wins because it can be online in a year, while the nuclear plant will take 8-12 years to be built.  Pollution from the alternate power source (until the new plant is built) is much, much lower with wind.

I'm not saying I don't want nukes. I agree that it will take a variety of methods.  But if I have to push wind to get anything done, then I'll do it.  

And yes, everyone has the NIMBY issue.  I'm one of the few who thinks turbines are awe-inspiring.  

Sorry, I'm going beyond your intentions, but I see so much mis-information that I try to correct it when it crops up.
Posted by: Erasmus, FCD on Sep. 11 2012,20:06

i live in the middle of wind central and I can say that I prefer that bullshit to corn
Posted by: Glen Davidson on Sep. 11 2012,22:35

Quote (OgreMkV @ Sep. 11 2012,18:27)
   
Quote (midwifetoad @ Sep. 11 2012,17:28)
What alternatives? I'd like to see some numbers and time lines. There are costs associated with manufacturing the alternatives.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------


And there are costs with building coal and fossil plants... one of the largest of which is pumping more CO2 into the atmosphere.

Look at the links in my blog.  One of them includes lifetime costs of multiple generation systems.

Here, I've done the research for you... or at least found it.
< http://www.eia.gov/forecas....ion.cfm >

According to the above, the levelized cost for wind is already better than coal.

In fact, wind and hydro are both better than all fossil fuels except combined cycle natural gas.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------


No, that isn't what it states at all.  It specifically lists dispatchable and non-dispatchable sources of power separately, because they're not comparable, or at least they are difficult to compare.  One simply cannot compare kwh costs (eta, or capital/megawatthour, which correlates strongly to cost/kwh although not the same) from wind straight up to any dispatchable source, since wind has to be backed up at least 90% by other generating facilities, making capital costs for wind very high indeed.

Here's a source that tries to compare wind as a non-dispatchable source to dispatchable sources, and it claims that nuclear is in fact the cheapest source of power when carbon costs are factored in (Kyoto style?) medium-term, combined cycle gas the cheapest short-term, with wind more costly than both:

< http://www.civitas.org.uk/economy....012.pdf >

This is for the UK, but this should be not so very different from the US.

Here's a source that points out the fact that backup power often has an efficiency penalty that should be factored into the equation, which it typically is not:

< http://www.clepair.net/windsec....et.html >

I can't vouch for either source, my primary point being that they at least address the problems that a non-dispatchable source such as wind has.  The carbon costs of building both wind generators and backup sources can't be slight, either.

I'm one who tends to think that we probably should increase wind generation in this country.  But the way in which wind "costs" are compared directly to the kwh costs of dispatchable sources so often is one of the reasons nothing gets done, because the economics are totally screwed up when this is done.  Well, just build wind turbines, never mind the carbon and economic costs of having to back up nearly all of that generating capacity.

Glen Davidson
Posted by: Glen Davidson on Sep. 11 2012,22:45

Just a small addition to the foregoing post:  The UK discussion of power costs mentions the coldest periods as the time when generation of electricity must be highest, and also when winds are slight, since colder periods are times of high pressure.  

For the US, heat waves are when the most electricity has to be generated, since we have much more air conditioning.  Regardless, the hottest periods are also typically times of high pressure and low winds, meaning that once again peak power is going to be when wind contributes little.

Glen Davidson
Posted by: midwifetoad on Sep. 11 2012,23:22

I would like to be clear that I am not trying to minimize the problem. I am just trying to clarify rhe obstacles to solutions.

If we have 50 years then wind and solar become options. For the short run -- 15 to 30 years --  nukes are the best bet. In my opinion.
Posted by: George on Sep. 12 2012,01:00

Quote (midwifetoad @ Sep. 11 2012,18:46)
Every technology seems to have its enemies. Wind turbines are ugly and kill birds. Everyone wants them but not nearby.

Personally I'm interested in thorium. China seems to be going in that direction. I assume we'll be buying their reactors in ten years.

My point is that opposition to solutions comes from so many directions. I don't think it coincides with the antievolution crowd.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------


The psych research didn't find correlations between opposition to alternative energy solutions and anti-science attitudes, it was about correlations between climate change denialism in the first place and anti-science.  Opposition to different solutions does come from different directions, but opposition to the idea that there's a problem in the first place seems to be closely associated with the anti-evolution and conspiracy theorist crowd.

As to wind turbines, they do kill some birds (and bats), but so do living room windows.  Where it becomes ecologically significant is where wind farms are sited along migratory paths or where there are populations of rare raptors.  There is also the scarecrow effect of turbines frightening away birds from an area, but this depends on the species involved as some become more acclimatised to others.  A good EIA system and a good planning framework should (!) sort this out.  Visual impact issues are certainly an issue, and many people are vehemently opposed to them.  Personally I like the look of wind farms in the right places, but as I earn part of my living from wind farm EIAs, I might be biased.
Posted by: Tracy P. Hamilton on Sep. 12 2012,08:24

Quote (midwifetoad @ Sep. 11 2012,18:46)
Every technology seems to have its enemies. Wind turbines are ugly and kill birds. Everyone wants them but not nearby.

Personally I'm interested in thorium. China seems to be going in that direction. I assume we'll be buying their reactors in ten years.

My point is that opposition to solutions comes from so many directions. I don't think it coincides with the antievolution crowd.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------


The rejection of science is precisely from people who want to do no solutions at all, i.e. maintain the status quo.  Rejections of solutions (engineering, not science) are at least based in reality, whether correct or no.  Wind power won't work well where I live, because there is like, no wind.
Posted by: Tracy P. Hamilton on Sep. 12 2012,08:28

Quote (midwifetoad @ Sep. 11 2012,23:22)
I would like to be clear that I am not trying to minimize the problem. I am just trying to clarify rhe obstacles to solutions.

If we have 50 years then wind and solar become options. For the short run -- 15 to 30 years --  nukes are the best bet. In my opinion.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------


and conservation.  What we need is to get serious about implementation of all alternatives, and about research to improve all areas (and the grid to handle it).  I don't see the leadership from US government there.
Posted by: Tracy P. Hamilton on Sep. 12 2012,08:38

Quote (midwifetoad @ Sep. 11 2012,17:28)
What alternatives? I'd like to see some numbers and time lines. There are costs associated with manufacturing the alternatives.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------


Germany is the best example of a country making a serious effort. "The share of electricity produced from renewable energy in Germany has increased from 6.3 percent of the national total in 2000 to about 25 percent in the first half of 2012."
Posted by: midwifetoad on Sep. 12 2012,13:11

Putting on my pessimist cap, it looks a bit like 1938 in the world today. Perhaps after the next world war, the infrastructure will be rebuilt around renewable energy.
Posted by: Tracy P. Hamilton on Sep. 12 2012,14:28

Quote (midwifetoad @ Sep. 12 2012,13:11)
Putting on my pessimist cap, it looks a bit like 1938 in the world today. Perhaps after the next world war, the infrastructure will be rebuilt around renewable energy.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------


Documentaries from the future (Mad Max and the Thunderdome, and Riverworld) show that we will still rely on petroleum's long dead hand.  Don't ask about the green stuff being served as food.
Posted by: midwifetoad on Sep. 12 2012,15:25

Quote (Tracy P. Hamilton @ Sep. 12 2012,14:28)
Quote (midwifetoad @ Sep. 12 2012,13:11)
Putting on my pessimist cap, it looks a bit like 1938 in the world today. Perhaps after the next world war, the infrastructure will be rebuilt around renewable energy.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------


Documentaries from the future (Mad Max and the Thunderdome, and Riverworld) show that we will still rely on petroleum's long dead hand.  Don't ask about the green stuff being served as food.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------


I'm thinking were are entering a new cold war. I hope it's cold.

But petroleum could get more expensive real fast, and that's really what it will take. It would be one of the better scenarios if we were forced to engineer and build new infrastructure on something like a wartime footing.

I still think the magnet problem is deeper than acknowledged, assuming small generators are going to replace centralized ones.
Posted by: Tracy P. Hamilton on Sep. 12 2012,16:19

Quote (midwifetoad @ Sep. 12 2012,15:25)
Quote (Tracy P. Hamilton @ Sep. 12 2012,14:28)
 
Quote (midwifetoad @ Sep. 12 2012,13:11)
Putting on my pessimist cap, it looks a bit like 1938 in the world today. Perhaps after the next world war, the infrastructure will be rebuilt around renewable energy.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------


Documentaries from the future (Mad Max and the Thunderdome, and Riverworld) show that we will still rely on petroleum's long dead hand.  Don't ask about the green stuff being served as food.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------


I'm thinking were are entering a new cold war. I hope it's cold.

But petroleum could get more expensive real fast, and that's really what it will take. It would be one of the better scenarios if we were forced to engineer and build new infrastructure on something like a wartime footing.

I still think the magnet problem is deeper than acknowledged, assuming small generators are going to replace centralized ones.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------


I have good news, kind of.  If we hold to current emissions, there will be no apocalypse.  :O   Hence bringing alternative technology online just enough to keep emissions from growing is all that is required.

The problems:  getting energy hogs to change their ways so that the gazillions of people in developing worlds can emulate us but in ways that won't make emissions grow crazily.

The immediate problem: getting Republicans to deal with reality.
Posted by: fnxtr on Sep. 12 2012,18:02

Quote (Tracy P. Hamilton @ Sep. 12 2012,14:19)
The problems:  getting energy hogs to change their ways so that the gazillions of people in developing worlds can emulate us but in ways that won't make emissions grow crazily.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------


That is, indeed, a problem:

"No, you can't burn coal, it's dirty... well, sure, England did it for ages, the U.S. is still doing it, but you can't.  You'll have to find some other way to reach our level of industrialization."
Posted by: Henry J on Sep. 12 2012,22:07

Too bad the hot air from science denialists can't be harnessed as a power source!

Henry
Posted by: dhogaza on Sep. 13 2012,15:16



---------------------QUOTE-------------------
As to the bird kills, every research article I can find on that subject points to one site, using old turbines that spin a higher rates of speed, causing a FEW bird deaths.  According to the report, cats killed more birds in the US than wind turbines.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------



Killing 500 California condors will have a greater ecological impact than killing 500,000 house sparrows (indeed, the condor would be extinct well before you managed to kill 500 of them).

This "we can measure the impact by counting the number of birds killed" meme is crap.  It's an intentional deflection.

The same argument can be made to claim that DDT, for instance, was not a significant threat to birds because after all, eggshell thinning only impacts a small number of species at the top of the food chain.  Yet the peregrine was extirpated throughout the lower 48 states, even though cats kill orders of magnitudes more birds than DDT killed indirectly, and even though their preferred urban prey species continue to flourish, frequently in pestilential numbers (starlings).

There are legitimate concerns regarding wind power and its effects on various species which are already under great pressure.

Fortunately, grown-ups have studied the problem, rather than simply say "cats!" as the wind industry did from the very beginning in their efforts to sweep concerns under the rug.

New designs are, as Oleg points out, better at least in regard to raptors as Altamont pass's early mills used derrick-style pylons which attracted red-tails and the like to perch-hunt from them (leading to them getting whacked by the turbine as they went to-and-fro their perch).

This has led to requirements to survey proposed sites for possible conflicts with species such as golden eagles (ridge sites) and prairie chickens and other increasingly rare gallinaceous birds (farm country sites).

< And no, I'm not just making this stuff up >  Mitigation, as described at the linked resource, is one approach.  To pretend there's no problem is simple ignorance.
Posted by: dhogaza on Sep. 13 2012,15:27



---------------------QUOTE-------------------
As to the bird kills, every research article I can find on that subject points to one site, using old turbines that spin a higher rates of speed, causing a FEW bird deaths.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------




< Just a few moments in google scholar uncovered this. >

I can only read the abstract and literature cites, but unless they introduce Altamont anecdotally and didn't bother to cite any study (unlikely) it would appear you need to google harder.

There's actually a *lot* of research going on regarding wind power impacts and mitigation on species of concern, along with long-term ongoing monitoring of fatalities at existing sites (in order to gather data which can be used to help model impacts of future wind farm installations), research into species behavior, etc etc.

It's a serious concern, not to be swept under the table by simply saying "cats!".

I'm a wind power supporter.  I'm also a believer in the TANSTAAFL principle.
Posted by: OgreMkV on Sep. 13 2012,16:07

Quote (dhogaza @ Sep. 13 2012,15:27)


---------------------QUOTE-------------------
As to the bird kills, every research article I can find on that subject points to one site, using old turbines that spin a higher rates of speed, causing a FEW bird deaths.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------




< Just a few moments in google scholar uncovered this. >

I can only read the abstract and literature cites, but unless they introduce Altamont anecdotally and didn't bother to cite any study (unlikely) it would appear you need to google harder.

There's actually a *lot* of research going on regarding wind power impacts and mitigation on species of concern, along with long-term ongoing monitoring of fatalities at existing sites (in order to gather data which can be used to help model impacts of future wind farm installations), research into species behavior, etc etc.

It's a serious concern, not to be swept under the table by simply saying "cats!".

I'm a wind power supporter.  I'm also a believer in the TANSTAAFL principle.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------


Ummm... that link goes to an article on "Nesting Ecology and Reproductive Success of Lesser Prairie-Chickens in Shinnery Oak-Dominated Rangelands"
Posted by: The whole truth on Dec. 13 2012,23:36

< http://news.yahoo.com/nearly-....98.html >
Posted by: stevestory on Dec. 14 2012,08:56

from the article whole truth linked:



---------------------QUOTE-------------------
The survey by the Public Religion Research Institute in partnership with the Religion News Service found political and religious disagreement on what is behind severe weather, which this year has included extreme heat and drought.

But nearly two-thirds (65 percent) of white evangelical Protestants say they think the storms are evidence of the "end times" as predicted by the Bible.

PRRI research director Daniel Cox said that some respondents - including 75 percent of non-white Protestants - believe extreme weather is both evidence of end times and the result of climate change.

Politics also color perceptions of the weather, the survey found. More than three-quarters of Democrats and six in 10 independents believe that the weather has become more extreme over the last few years, while less than half of Republicans say they have perceived such a shift.
__
"Their political leanings are even affecting how they experience weather, which is pretty fascinating," said Cox.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------



< confirmation bias >


---------------------QUOTE-------------------
Confirmation bias (also called confirmatory bias or myside bias) is a tendency of people to favor information that confirms their beliefs or hypotheses.[Note 1][1] People display this bias when they gather or remember information selectively, or when they interpret it in a biased way. The effect is stronger for emotionally charged issues and for deeply entrenched beliefs. For example, in reading about current political issues, people usually prefer sources that affirm their existing attitudes. They also tend to interpret ambiguous evidence as supporting their existing position.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------



I especially liked


---------------------QUOTE-------------------
"No one really knows how (end times) would look and how God would bring it about," Cox said.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------



But the LORD thickened the skulls of the tards, and they would not listen to Gore and Hansen...
Posted by: stevestory on Dec. 14 2012,09:00

Some say the world will end in fire,
Some say in ice,
But when I see ID's canard,
I hold with those who favor tard.
Posted by: k.e.. on Dec. 14 2012,09:19

Quote (stevestory @ Dec. 14 2012,17:00)
Some say the world will end in fire,
Some say in ice,
But when I see ID's canard,
I hold with those who favor tard.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------


Yummy duck for dinner again.

Posted by: Erasmus, FCD on Dec. 14 2012,09:24

Quote (stevestory @ Dec. 14 2012,09:56)
from the article whole truth linked:



---------------------QUOTE-------------------
The survey by the Public Religion Research Institute in partnership with the Religion News Service found political and religious disagreement on what is behind severe weather, which this year has included extreme heat and drought.

But nearly two-thirds (65 percent) of white evangelical Protestants say they think the storms are evidence of the "end times" as predicted by the Bible.

PRRI research director Daniel Cox said that some respondents - including 75 percent of non-white Protestants - believe extreme weather is both evidence of end times and the result of climate change.

Politics also color perceptions of the weather, the survey found. More than three-quarters of Democrats and six in 10 independents believe that the weather has become more extreme over the last few years, while less than half of Republicans say they have perceived such a shift.
__
"Their political leanings are even affecting how they experience weather, which is pretty fascinating," said Cox.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------



< confirmation bias >


---------------------QUOTE-------------------
Confirmation bias (also called confirmatory bias or myside bias) is a tendency of people to favor information that confirms their beliefs or hypotheses.[Note 1][1] People display this bias when they gather or remember information selectively, or when they interpret it in a biased way. The effect is stronger for emotionally charged issues and for deeply entrenched beliefs. For example, in reading about current political issues, people usually prefer sources that affirm their existing attitudes. They also tend to interpret ambiguous evidence as supporting their existing position.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------



I especially liked


---------------------QUOTE-------------------
"No one really knows how (end times) would look and how God would bring it about," Cox said.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------



But the LORD thickened the skulls of the tards, and they would not listen to Gore and Hansen...
---------------------QUOTE-------------------


apes gonna ape
Posted by: Henry J on Dec. 14 2012,11:20

Quote (k.e.. @ Dec. 14 2012,08:19)
Quote (stevestory @ Dec. 14 2012,17:00)
Some say the world will end in fire,
Some say in ice,
But when I see ID's canard,
I hold with those who favor tard.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------


Yummy duck for dinner again.

---------------------QUOTE-------------------


AFLAC!!!!!!!!
Posted by: Arctodus23 on Mar. 02 2013,11:32

Probably within 50 years, the ice caps will be gone.
Posted by: stevestory on Mar. 02 2013,12:31

I had an old physics professor who thought civilization was a new and fairly brief phase before we went back to being subsistence farmers/hunters. I thought it was an amusing quirk.

Now, the more I read about climate change and Peak Oil, the less amusing I find it.

This might be the answer to the fermi paradox--technological civilizations wreck themselves before they get anywhere else.
Posted by: khan on Mar. 02 2013,13:56

Quote (stevestory @ Mar. 02 2013,13:31)
I had an old physics professor who thought civilization was a new and fairly brief phase before we went back to being subsistence farmers/hunters. I thought it was an amusing quirk.

Now, the more I read about climate change and Peak Oil, the less amusing I find it.

This might be the answer to the fermi paradox--technological civilizations wreck themselves before they get anywhere else.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------


And civilization shall not rise again as we shall have used up all the easily accessible carbon fuels and metals.
Posted by: Erasmus, FCD on Mar. 02 2013,14:42

Quote (stevestory @ Mar. 02 2013,13:31)
I had an old physics professor who thought civilization was a new and fairly brief phase before we went back to being subsistence farmers/hunters. I thought it was an amusing quirk.

Now, the more I read about climate change and Peak Oil, the less amusing I find it.

This might be the answer to the fermi paradox--technological civilizations wreck themselves before they get anywhere else.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------


cf. Derrick Jensen
Posted by: Richardthughes on Mar. 02 2013,15:04

Quote (khan @ Mar. 02 2013,13:56)
Quote (stevestory @ Mar. 02 2013,13:31)
I had an old physics professor who thought civilization was a new and fairly brief phase before we went back to being subsistence farmers/hunters. I thought it was an amusing quirk.

Now, the more I read about climate change and Peak Oil, the less amusing I find it.

This might be the answer to the fermi paradox--technological civilizations wreck themselves before they get anywhere else.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------


And civilization shall not rise again as we shall have used up all the easily accessible carbon fuels and metals.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------


The reboot is MUCH harder..
Posted by: Lou FCD on Mar. 02 2013,16:36

Quote (stevestory @ Mar. 02 2013,13:31)
I had an old physics professor who thought civilization was a new and fairly brief phase before we went back to being subsistence farmers/hunters. I thought it was an amusing quirk.

Now, the more I read about climate change and Peak Oil, the less amusing I find it.

This might be the answer to the fermi paradox--technological civilizations wreck themselves before they get anywhere else.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------


A depressing thought I've been having frequently myself of late.
Posted by: OgreMkV on Mar. 02 2013,18:16

Quote (Lou FCD @ Mar. 02 2013,16:36)
Quote (stevestory @ Mar. 02 2013,13:31)
I had an old physics professor who thought civilization was a new and fairly brief phase before we went back to being subsistence farmers/hunters. I thought it was an amusing quirk.

Now, the more I read about climate change and Peak Oil, the less amusing I find it.

This might be the answer to the fermi paradox--technological civilizations wreck themselves before they get anywhere else.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------


A depressing thought I've been having frequently myself of late.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------


You aren't the only one.
Posted by: stevestory on Mar. 06 2013,15:54

atmospheric CO2 went up nearly .7% last year.

We are fuuuuuuucked.

I'm expecting bigtime crop failures, famines, wars, and gas scarcities over the next few decades.
Posted by: stevestory on Mar. 06 2013,16:08

Quote (Erasmus, FCD @ Mar. 02 2013,15:42)
Quote (stevestory @ Mar. 02 2013,13:31)
I had an old physics professor who thought civilization was a new and fairly brief phase before we went back to being subsistence farmers/hunters. I thought it was an amusing quirk.

Now, the more I read about climate change and Peak Oil, the less amusing I find it.

This might be the answer to the fermi paradox--technological civilizations wreck themselves before they get anywhere else.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------


cf. Derrick Jensen
---------------------QUOTE-------------------


While I agree with Jensen about many of the problems, I don't think his 'going indigenous' is a sensible answer. There are reasons indigenous people the world over got trampled by technologically-advanced shitheads.

I don't know what the answer is, in fact I think human nature might preclude any answer.

kevin drum:


---------------------QUOTE-------------------
Climate change is the public policy problem from hell. If you were inventing a problem that would be virtually impossible to solve, you'd give it all the characteristics of climate change: it's largely invisibile, it's slow moving, it's expensive to fix, it requires global coordination, and its effects will be disproportionately borne by poor countries that nobody cares about.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------



though in the end, of course, the problems will hit us very hard too.
Posted by: stevestory on Mar. 06 2013,16:20

I'm doing a lot of climate/energy/water reading right now. Two good reads:

< wikipedia: peak oil >
< the last oil shock >

Also, after getting my BA in physics in 2005, I've been a math teacher/tutor for most of the last 7 years, but I'm burned out. Wondering if there are any career opportunities related to this sort of stuff. (if I had to do it over again I'd prob have done geology for career purposes) If anyone has any ideas, lemme know.
Posted by: stevestory on Mar. 06 2013,16:34

< good climate blog--mother jones's Blue Marble >
Posted by: Woodbine on Mar. 06 2013,16:42

Become a DI Fellow.

Just throw up a few blogs whining about Darwin, Hitler et al....$25,000 a year.

We won't tell, promise.
Posted by: Erasmus, FCD on Mar. 06 2013,17:07

Quote (stevestory @ Mar. 06 2013,17:08)
While I agree with Jensen about many of the problems, I don't think his 'going indigenous' is a sensible answer. There are reasons indigenous people the world over got trampled by technologically-advanced shitheads.

I don't know what the answer is, in fact I think human nature might preclude any answer.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------


Well, there are still lots of people living in these traditions, yet.

But I agree, they will be exploited, when possible, by people who reject those traditions.

not sure there is one human nature.
Posted by: dhogaza on Mar. 06 2013,18:09

stevestory:



---------------------QUOTE-------------------
Also, after getting my BA in physics in 2005, I've been a math teacher/tutor for most of the last 7 years, but I'm burned out. Wondering if there are any career opportunities related to this sort of stuff.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------



There's tons of modeling stuff going on.  Agencies are deeply interested in how the hydrology of various watersheds and basins will be impacted by future climate change, how regional weather will change, impacts on ecosystems, etc.

Getting into such work probably involves grad school, but a BA in physics and a background in math is a good foundation for such work.  A friend of mine who's been involved in such modeling work (not the software implementation, but applying models to individual watersheds and their particular geological and hydrological characteristics combined with modeled regional changes in weather patterns) has a MS in hydrology.  For a lot of agency jobs of this nature a MS is sufficient.

Of course Republicans in the US want to cut government in half so maybe looking at an agency career isn't such a great idea ...
Posted by: dvunkannon on April 03 2013,09:51

< http://wattsupwiththat.com/2013.......e-83360 >

This comment by Joe Bastardi (the denialists favorite weatherman) shows more of the convergence of ID and AGW craziness. (As if Joe G posting on WUWT wasn't enough.)



---------------------QUOTE-------------------
Joseph Bastardi says:
April 3, 2013 at 3:50 am
It will shift back over the coming decades as the PDO and AMO flips will show you.
its a natural back and forth, because of the way the planet was designed
Eccl 1:9
---------------------QUOTE-------------------



Everything is a natural cycle, and we have nothing to worry about - King Solomon told us so! (ASSF)
Posted by: Quack on April 03 2013,12:21

On the debate page of a newspaper here I found the title

"Global cooling followed by ice age."

In a feature article professor of meteorology Horst Malberg warns the German people about several decades of global cooling. Other German climate researchers are in prestigious Die Welt quoted about a possible ice age soon in Europe.

< Lennart Bengtsson >

< Horst Malberg >

Looks like the pro and con AGW is here to stay until ...?


Posted by: OgreMkV on April 03 2013,12:52

Quote (Quack @ April 03 2013,12:21)
Looks like the pro and con AGW is here to stay until ...?
---------------------QUOTE-------------------


The heat death of the universe... which is actually very cold... which proves the AGW deniers had it right all along.
Posted by: dvunkannon on April 03 2013,17:21

Quote (Quack @ April 03 2013,13:21)
On the debate page of a newspaper here I found the title

"Global cooling followed by ice age."

In a feature article professor of meteorology Horst Malberg warns the German people about several decades of global cooling. Other German climate researchers are in prestigious Die Welt quoted about a possible ice age soon in Europe.

< Lennart Bengtsson >

< Horst Malberg >

Looks like the pro and con AGW is here to stay until ...?
---------------------QUOTE-------------------


Your Malberg link goes to another Bengtsson article on NoTricksZone.

Malberg seems to be another loon trying to put everything on solar cycles, no peer review, etc. Taken down previously be science bloggers.

Bengtsson's article seems to be from a retired scientist who doesn't understand the communication problems with the public. He seems to accept the underlying reality of GHG driving climate change, but is throwing up his hands over the ferocity of the debate. Sorry, you don't get to choose that.


Posted by: dvunkannon on April 04 2013,10:21

Quack and all German reading friends,

< http://www.scilogs.de/wblogs....-wetter >

A good explanation by a leading scientist of the relation of the warming arctic and cold weather in Europe and North America. The English translation is available on several blogs, including the invaluable
< http://neven1.typepad.com/blog....log >
Arctic Sea Ice blog
Posted by: Kattarina98 on April 04 2013,10:24

Thank you very much. That will help me convince all those who have started to doubt in the last weeks.
Posted by: fnxtr on April 04 2013,11:25

Quote (stevestory @ Mar. 06 2013,13:54)
atmospheric CO2 went up nearly .7% last year.

We are fuuuuuuucked.

I'm expecting bigtime crop failures, famines, wars, and gas scarcities over the next few decades.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------


How's your flint-knapping skillz?
Posted by: midwifetoad on April 04 2013,13:01

Quote (stevestory @ Mar. 06 2013,15:54)
atmospheric CO2 went up nearly .7% last year.

We are fuuuuuuucked.

I'm expecting bigtime crop failures, famines, wars, and gas scarcities over the next few decades.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------


I'm going to assume that you mean the annual average has increased from 387 to 393 ppm since 2010. Not the the percentage of total gasses increasec by .7 percent.

Oddly, the U.S. seems to have achieved its Kyoto protocol goals recently, and per capita emissions is down.

If the world moved more to natural gas and nukes, much of the problem would be solved. It would certainly buy time -- 50 to 100 years -- for greener technologies to come online.

It's a dark secret that the United States in on track to become energy independent in less than a decade. Not many press releases about natural gas production.

I realize it has the potential for other kinds of pollution, but not planet killers.


Posted by: fnxtr on April 04 2013,15:27

Quote (midwifetoad @ April 04 2013,11:01)
Quote (stevestory @ Mar. 06 2013,15:54)
atmospheric CO2 went up nearly .7% last year.

We are fuuuuuuucked.

I'm expecting bigtime crop failures, famines, wars, and gas scarcities over the next few decades.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------


I'm going to assume that you mean the annual average has increased from 387 to 393 ppm since 2010. Not the the percentage of total gasses increasec by .7 percent.

Oddly, the U.S. seems to have achieved its Kyoto protocol goals recently, and per capita emissions is down.

If the world moved more to natural gas and nukes, much of the problem would be solved. It would certainly buy time -- 50 to 100 years -- for greener technologies to come online.

It's a dark secret that the United States in on track to become energy independent in less than a decade. Not many press releases about natural gas production.

I realize it has the potential for other kinds of pollution, but not planet killers.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------


From what I've heard recently I'm more afraid of LNG fracking than I am of nukes. Removes millions of tons of water from the cycle, and essentially turns it (mixed with silica sand, antibiotics, concentrated leachants, and suspension media) into plate lubricant.

Like they say, "When there's a solar energy spill, it's just called 'a nice day'".

Still, you can't make plastic out of wind, so it looks like fossil fuels are going be on the menu for a while.

Likewise, as long as there's steel, there will be coal mines.
Posted by: stevestory on April 04 2013,17:14

Methane release from natural gas, the CO2 from burning natural gas, the permafrost melting and accelerating things, and methane hydrates either being mined or, due to heat, spontaneouly releasing from the sea floor...

I like nukes, esp pebble bed reactors, but after fukushima it's an impossible sell.

Shitty thing is, we already have the tech to do a massive build-out of solar thermal installations and shut down every coal plant in the country, but money, politics, and ignorance make it impossible.
Posted by: OgreMkV on April 04 2013,17:45

Quote (stevestory @ April 04 2013,17:14)
Methane release from natural gas, the CO2 from burning natural gas, the permafrost melting and accelerating things, and methane hydrates either being mined or, due to heat, spontaneouly releasing from the sea floor...

I like nukes, esp pebble bed reactors, but after fukushima it's an impossible sell.

Shitty thing is, we already have the tech to do a massive build-out of solar thermal installations and shut down every coal plant in the country, but money, politics, and ignorance make it impossible.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------


^  This
Posted by: stevestory on April 05 2013,10:15

< 1600 years of ice in the andes has melted in 25. >
Posted by: midwifetoad on April 05 2013,10:40

I consider myself a political realist rather than an idealist or sentimentalist.

Realism doesn't mean I can't be wrong. It just means I endeavor to see where the jujitsu levers are. One person or a few people cannot change the world by force. Hell, even the Chinese army can't change the way the world works.

But a few people can have and promote ideas for change.

I happen to believe (and can certainly be wrong) that ideas are most forceful when presented as ways of giving people things they want, as opposed to taking away things they have.

It's an interesting thing to me that the material things people want are beginning to arrive in smaller and less material intensive packages. Computers, phones, entertainment systems are all more energy efficient than they were three decades ago.

If this is a trend, I can see some light ahead. It is possible to reduce per capita energy usage without taking stuff away from people.

Maybe.

The question in my mind is how you from here to the next century without world wars. I certainly think there will be wars if rich countries try to stop development in poor countries. And it is the poor countries coming on line that will be the worst carbon emitters.
Posted by: Quack on April 05 2013,10:59

I may be a sentimental realist, but I can't help seeing many reasons for thinking that to solve some of our problems it might be a good idea to start thinking about stabilizing the world's human population at a smaller number of billions than what we have today.
Posted by: OgreMkV on April 05 2013,11:02

Quote (midwifetoad @ April 05 2013,10:40)
I consider myself a political realist rather than an idealist or sentimentalist.

Realism doesn't mean I can't be wrong. It just means I endeavor to see where the jujitsu levers are. One person or a few people cannot change the world by force. Hell, even the Chinese army can't change the way the world works.

But a few people can have and promote ideas for change.

I happen to believe (and can certainly be wrong) that ideas are most forceful when presented as ways of giving people things they want, as opposed to taking away things they have.

It's an interesting thing to me that the material things people want are beginning to arrive in smaller and less material intensive packages. Computers, phones, entertainment systems are all more energy efficient than they were three decades ago.

If this is a trend, I can see some light ahead. It is possible to reduce per capita energy usage without taking stuff away from people.

Maybe.

The question in my mind is how you from here to the next century without world wars. I certainly think there will be wars if rich countries try to stop development in poor countries. And it is the poor countries coming on line that will be the worst carbon emitters.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------


Sadly, I think one of the biggest issues coming up isn't electricity, but water rights.

There's a huge fight within the state of Texas as to who has water rights and how can be given access to water.  

We haven't solved the electricity problem, but we've helped (LEDs, solar, wind, etc).  Now to do the same with water (HE washers, personal dehumidifiers?)
Posted by: stevestory on April 05 2013,11:42

Yeah. If i had to do it all over again, i'd have done geology instead of physics. Water and hydrocarbons are going to be the two most important things for the rest of my lifetime.
Posted by: midwifetoad on April 05 2013,12:10

Quote (Quack @ April 05 2013,10:59)
I may be a sentimental realist, but I can't help seeing many reasons for thinking that to solve some of our problems it might be a good idea to start thinking about stabilizing the world's human population at a smaller number of billions than what we have today.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------


Several things seem to be necessary to stabilize or reduce population growth. One is economic sufficiency, so that parents do not count on children for support in old age.

The other is rights for women. I thought that concept was settled a few decades ago in industrialized countries, but it is now on the front burner, entangled in the current religious war.
Posted by: Bob O'H on April 05 2013,12:15

Quote (midwifetoad @ April 04 2013,13:01)
If the world moved more to natural gas and nukes, much of the problem would be solved. It would certainly buy time -- 50 to 100 years -- for greener technologies to come online.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------


Indeed. Nuke the US, China, and Europe and you'll reduce CO2 emissions considerably.

Wait a moment, could that be North Korea's plan? They're doing it for the climate?
Posted by: midwifetoad on April 05 2013,12:37

Quote (Bob O'H @ April 05 2013,12:15)
Quote (midwifetoad @ April 04 2013,13:01)
If the world moved more to natural gas and nukes, much of the problem would be solved. It would certainly buy time -- 50 to 100 years -- for greener technologies to come online.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------


Indeed. Nuke the US, China, and Europe and you'll reduce CO2 emissions considerably.

Wait a moment, could that be North Korea's plan? They're doing it for the climate?
---------------------QUOTE-------------------


North Korea may be the most carbon friendly country on earth. Just as Cuba was for decades a wilderness friendly country.

The trick is to get to stability and sustainability without becoming NK.
Posted by: Arctodus23 on April 28 2013,10:38

< A page from RC >
Posted by: dvunkannon on May 12 2013,09:27

There are some great evolution videos out there, here is one for global warming -

< http://www.youtube.com/watch?v....04VJDco >

The last bit on evidence/fact/hypothesis/etc. is excellent.
Posted by: Arctodus23 on May 28 2013,16:10

Quote (dvunkannon @ May 12 2013,09:27)
There are some great evolution videos out there, here is one for global warming -

< http://www.youtube.com/watch?v....04VJDco >

The last bit on evidence/fact/hypothesis/etc. is excellent.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------


Just to let you know...The citations were in another picture frame video.
Posted by: Arctodus23 on May 29 2013,10:51

A fun cartoon from RealClimate.org:

< http://www.realclimate.org/index.p....-change >
Posted by: Thrinaxodon on June 06 2013,13:48

AGW is a myth. For example, some if the glaciers are getting larger.
Posted by: OgreMkV on June 06 2013,14:34

Quote (Thrinaxodon @ June 06 2013,13:48)
AGW is a myth. For example, some if the glaciers are getting larger.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------


Name one glacier that is larger today than it was 10 years ago.
Posted by: Tracy P. Hamilton on June 06 2013,15:14

Quote (Thrinaxodon @ June 06 2013,13:48)
AGW is a myth. For example, some if the glaciers are getting larger.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------


Since AGW does not expect all glaciers to retreat at the same time, the fact that a few are growing at any one time or location is not evidence that AGW is wrong.

< http://www.grid.unep.ch/glacier....ers.pdf >  Figure 5.1 shows the retreating glaciers in red, the advancing ones in blue.  Huge difference.
Posted by: Thrinaxodon on June 06 2013,15:19

Quote (OgreMkV @ June 06 2013,14:34)
Quote (Thrinaxodon @ June 06 2013,13:48)
AGW is a myth. For example, some if the glaciers are getting larger.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------


Name one glacier that is larger today than it was 10 years ago.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------


There's been glaciers growing in Alaska, Norway, etc.

< http://wattsupwiththat.com/2008....g-again >
Posted by: dhogaza on June 14 2013,13:27



---------------------QUOTE-------------------
There's been glaciers growing in Alaska, Norway, etc.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------



That's pretty much the standard level of logic of denialist arguments.

"only 99% of glaciers are shrinking, therefore it is getting colder."
Posted by: Soapy Sam on June 14 2013,14:12

Quote (dhogaza @ June 14 2013,19:27)
     

---------------------QUOTE-------------------
There's been glaciers growing in Alaska, Norway, etc.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------



That's pretty much the standard level of logic of denialist arguments.

"only 99% of glaciers are shrinking, therefore it is getting colder."
---------------------QUOTE-------------------



Yup!

< http://www.skepticalscience.com/himalay....sic.htm >

Ice may become more plastic as temperature rises, causing a temporary increase in extent. And it may start snowing more (see:"too cold for snow". Ask your granny Thrinaxodon; something of a myth but there is a grain of truth due to inability of colder air to hold as much moisture.). Glaciers are shrinking despite these effects. Now, what could possibly make that happen?
Posted by: Dr.GH on June 15 2013,10:33

Don Prothero wrote a nice review of GW data for the Johns Hopkins University Press blog.

< http://jhupressblog.com/2013.......ps-back >


Posted by: Henry J on June 17 2013,13:26

...
Posted by: Henry J on June 17 2013,13:28

Quote (Bob O'H @ April 05 2013,11:15)
Quote (midwifetoad @ April 04 2013,13:01)
If the world moved more to natural gas and nukes, much of the problem would be solved. It would certainly buy time -- 50 to 100 years -- for greener technologies to come online.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------


Indeed. Nuke the US, China, and Europe and you'll reduce CO2 emissions considerably.

Wait a moment, could that be North Korea's plan? They're doing it for the climate?
---------------------QUOTE-------------------


But, that would alter the climate in a bunch of other ways! ;)
Posted by: midwifetoad on June 17 2013,14:35

Cooling is a good thing. Right?
Posted by: Quack on June 17 2013,16:24

Midwifetoad said:  

---------------------QUOTE-------------------
If the world moved more to natural gas and nukes, much of the problem would be solved. It would certainly buy time -- 50 to 100 years -- for greener technologies to come online.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------



The problem won't be solved. The environmentalists here are objecting to further oil and gas exploration and making much noise about CO2 reduction, in a country with total emissions on the order of 1/300th of China's. (Or was it 1/300th of China's yearly increase?) Kids making noise about oh how we have to protect the environment.

We are even refusing to use our own gas, but don't mind receiving electricty generated on the continent - from Norwegian gas (or Danish import coal). El-distribution here is a push-pull operation, cables to the continent used in both directions according to consumption patterns.

Anyway, the less we do to limit emissions, the sooner the world will wake up to realize which way we are going.

ETA 'import'


Posted by: dvunkannon on June 17 2013,20:26

If anyone was missing DaveScot from UD, he's currently pretty active in the discussion over at Judith Curry's blog.

The following exchange is from
< http://judithcurry.com/2013....missing >



---------------------QUOTE-------------------
David Springer | June 17, 2013 at 9:52 am | Reply
What’s missing is modeling the earth as a water world instead of a dry rock. If the atmosphere was 99.97% nitrogen and 0.03% CO2 and the surface was dry rock like the moon then doubling CO2 would cause a mean temperature rise across the entire sphere of 1.1C. Water changes everything. Modelers invented, out of whole cloth it appears, so-called water vapor amplification which transforms 1.1C of well modeled sensitivity into 3C of poorly modeled sensitivity. It appears now that is quite wrong and water vapor amplification is non-existent. My take on what happens is that the cloud deck rises by about 100 meters for every CO2 doubling but cloud temperature remains unchanged and instead the lapse rate between cloud and ground changes. This is called lapse-rate feedback. It’s a negative feedback and its magnitude is not well known. If the same temperature cloud is at a higher level in the atmosphere then by definition there is less greenhouse gas between the cloud top and space and more greenhouse gas between the cloud bottom and the ground. This gives the heat in the cloud a less restrictive radiative path to space and a more restrictive path back to the ground. A mere 100 meter change in cloud height equates to a 1.0C lapse-rate feedback and thus nullifies the effect of doubling CO2. Critically, where there is little or no water on the surface to evaporate and form clouds there is nothing to nullify the warming effect. So over land, especially where the land is frozen, we should see a larger warming effect. In fact this is what we do observe.

Rob Starkey | June 17, 2013 at 10:25 am |
Dave

Your theory may be correct, but I think you’s have to admit that there is large leap from a general theory and developing a model that reliably performs. Many of us have theories, but they are worth little. Mine involves the interaction with the deep oceans, but until someone can demonstrate a GCM that reliably performs…..well it is all just meaningless talk

David Springer | June 17, 2013 at 5:50 pm |
Rob the ocean is over 70% of the surface and over 90% of the heat capacity. It isn’t subject to variation from urban heat islands, land use change, albedo change (except a small % due to seasonal sea ice extent change). The entire surface is even all at almost exactly the same elevation.

Ya figures out what the ocean does in response to C02 change and everything else is details.

As of now the best empirical data (which isn’t very accurate at such tiny wattages) says the ocean basin is accumulating heat at the rate of 0.5W/m2. This is enough to raise the basin temperature 0.2C per century. Per CENTURY. That isn’t cause for alarm.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------



But there is a better exchange that proves Dave is still our Dave earlier in the thread:



---------------------QUOTE-------------------
David Springer | June 17, 2013 at 8:55 am | Reply
David Young | June 16, 2013 at 10:43 pm | Reply

“Basically, adding more “physics” doesn’t increase accuracy if in fact it becomes more accurate to constrain all the additional parameters with data.”

Constraining parameters with data. Gee, that almost sounds like something out of the scientific method. You know, like hypothesis (what you think the parameters should be), prediction (the result of the parameterization), and test (does the hypothesis explain the measured result of experiments). Lather rinse and repeat unitl the hypothesis predicts the experimental results. Then you have a candidate for a theory if the final step, replication by others, is successful.

Constraining the existing parameters with data should be the first step. And not just any data. The data itself is often insuffucient in scope and quality such that it’s pencil whipped into “better” fitness for purpose. Better in this case too often means a better fit to desired outcomes (cough cough hockey stick cough cough).

Brian H | June 17, 2013 at 10:13 am |
Note the correction to the sentence you critique. Start over, rewrite.

Steven Mosher | June 17, 2013 at 11:05 am |
Brian, be quiet. Springer is now a fluid dynamics expert. And just yesterday he invention the Li on battery for Dell

Venter | June 17, 2013 at 11:31 am |
Yeah and Mosh is an ” engineer ” with a major in English and Philosophy, eminently qualified and knowledgeable to comment about fluid dynamics.
What a jerk!

Pissant Progressive | June 17, 2013 at 11:42 am |
heh. 2 smart guys that are almost as smart as they think they are.

David Springer | June 17, 2013 at 5:10 pm |
I don’t have a problem with the corrected sentence.

David Springer | June 17, 2013 at 5:14 pm |
@Venter

English and philosophy, huh. That explains why he can’t engineer his way out of a paper bag. But it doesn’t explain why he sucks at English and philosophy.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------


Posted by: dhogaza on June 18 2013,11:34



---------------------QUOTE-------------------
Modelers invented, out of whole cloth it appears, so-called water vapor amplification which transforms 1.1C of well modeled sensitivity into 3C of poorly modeled sensitivity.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------






---------------------QUOTE-------------------
Ya figures out what the ocean does in response to C02 change and everything else is details.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------



Poor Dave.  As CO2 forcing increases and temps rise, relative humidity stays roughly the same because so much of the earth is covered by ocean.  The second quote is correct.  The first quote is bullshit as "modelers" didn't invent water vapor feedback "out of whole cloth", it is derived from the Clausius-Clapeyron equation and long-established physics used in meteorology.

Sigh.
Posted by: dhogaza on June 18 2013,11:38

Man, I could get into a cage fight between Steven Mosher and DaveScot Springer.  Dave has met his match in arrogance, immorality, dishonesty, and general all-around assholedness.

For those not familiar with Mosher, some years back he coined the nickname "Piltdown Mann" for Michael Mann, implying that Mann's paleoclimate reconstruction work (aka "hockey stick") was an intentional fraud ala the Piltdown Man fraud.

He, along with an even more ignorant jerk named Tom Fuller, co-authored a book on "climategate" which was filled with accusations of scientific misconduct, etc.

He is slime, as is DaveScot, so I suggest the cage fight be held in a slimepit.
Posted by: k.e.. on June 18 2013,21:52

Quote (dhogaza @ June 18 2013,19:38)
Man, I could get into a cage fight between Steven Mosher and DaveScot Springer.  Dave has met his match in arrogance, immorality, dishonesty, and general all-around assholedness.

For those not familiar with Mosher, some years back he coined the nickname "Piltdown Mann" for Michael Mann, implying that Mann's paleoclimate reconstruction work (aka "hockey stick") was an intentional fraud ala the Piltdown Man fraud.

He, along with an even more ignorant jerk named Tom Fuller, co-authored a book on "climategate" which was filled with accusations of scientific misconduct, etc.

He is slime, as is DaveScot, so I suggest the cage fight be held in a slimepit.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------


better yet set up a blog as an ex Navy lesbian marine biologist with a drinking problem who's battling the PTB in water world over the falseness of AGW and invite him over....
Posted by: Richardthughes on July 10 2013,14:32

< http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs....s-graph >



Posted by: Tracy P. Hamilton on July 10 2013,19:26

Quote (Richardthughes @ July 10 2013,14:32)
< http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs......s-graph >



---------------------QUOTE-------------------


Quite clearly the temperature has been perfectly flat from 2001-2010.  :p


Posted by: stevestory on July 10 2013,19:54

Quote (Tracy P. Hamilton @ July 10 2013,20:26)
Quite clearly the temperature has been perfectly flat from 2001-2010.  :p
---------------------QUOTE-------------------


< You laugh, but George Will gets paid 10x what I do to say things like that. >
Posted by: stevestory on Dec. 17 2013,19:37

< Reddit's Science Forum Just Banned Climate Denial >
Posted by: Henry J on Mar. 22 2022,11:16

That's Greek to me!
Or whatever language.
Posted by: Cubist on Mar. 28 2022,16:48

Quote (Henry J @ Mar. 22 2022,11:16)
That's Greek to me!
Or whatever language.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------


The text is in Cyrillic, so prolly Russian.
Posted by: rossum on Mar. 29 2022,03:18

Quote (Cubist @ Mar. 28 2022,16:48)
Quote (Henry J @ Mar. 22 2022,11:16)
That's Greek to me!
Or whatever language.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------


The text is in Cyrillic, so prolly Russian.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------


The web address in the spam links is "---.by" so more likely Belarussian, rather than Russian, which would be "---.ru".

$0.02
Posted by: Henry J on May 18 2022,11:07

Watch yer langwitch!

ETA: Never mind; that post isn't there now.
Posted by: Lou FCD on May 24 2022,07:49

Deleted two spam posts.
Posted by: Dr.GH on May 24 2022,11:14

Quote (Lou FCD @ May 24 2022,05:49)
Deleted two spam posts.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------


Good

:D
Posted by: fnxtr on May 24 2022,22:08

Quote (Dr.GH @ May 24 2022,09:14)
 
Quote (Lou FCD @ May 24 2022,05:49)
Deleted two spam posts.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------


Good

:D
---------------------QUOTE-------------------


Just browsing occasionally... your sig reminded me that I once told a friend that my cosmology is based on The Misanthropic Principle, i.e., the universe is fine-tuned to piss me off.
Posted by: k.e.. on May 26 2022,08:02

Quote (fnxtr @ May 25 2022,06:08)
   
Quote (Dr.GH @ May 24 2022,09:14)
       
Quote (Lou FCD @ May 24 2022,05:49)
Deleted two spam posts.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------


Good

:D
---------------------QUOTE-------------------


Just browsing occasionally... your sig reminded me that I once told a friend that my cosmology is based on The Misanthropic Principle, i.e., the universe is fine-tuned to piss me off.
---------------------QUOTE-------------------


Oh yeah humor, remember that?
Well here's the UK's apparent comedian's comedian to prove you don't need to know much about zoology, biology, geology, geography, marine biology, crypto-zoology, evolutionary theory, evolutionary biology, meteorology, luminolgy, history, herparolgy, paleontology or archeology.....watch for the ponce line.

< Stewart Lee >

edited affectation

but he is inclusive <
Les Misérables >
Posted by: Wesley R. Elsberry on Nov. 28 2022,12:15

I put together a blog post based on a conversation Diane and I were in earlier in the year.

< Climate Change: Responding to ‘No One Knows If It Is Us’ >

The main thing I want to point out here is that there was an < Exxon internal research study on climate change >. In 1982, the Exxon engineers and geoscientists wrote up an internal report. A few years back, that internal report was leaked. Putting this in context, the Exxon 1982 internal report was done seven years prior to the IPCC being formed, and sixteen years earlier than Michael Mann's 'hockey stick' paper was published.

There are a couple of notable figures from that report.



Figure 3 shows the projections from the Exxon 1982 internal report for two models each for CO2 concentration and temperature change.

In late 2019, I got Figure 3 and decided to put 2019 actual values on the graph. I did this by importing the original in CorelDraw and overlaying gird lines and hand-placing the values.



There's about 3% error in the 37-year forecast horizon on both CO2 concentration and temperature change. That's not bad for the sort of mathematical climate model that Exxon (and Exxon-Mobil) has spent millions in PR saying can't possibly be accurate.

Here's another graph.



Figure 9 from the 1982 Exxon internal report shows a band of normal temperature variation, but it also shows the upward temperature deviation band that would be expected from continued anthropogenic greenhouse gas emissions under their models. There is discussion of two delays that would happen: the delay until people were able to reliably distinguish the upward temperature deviation from background noise, and the delay from that point until effective regulation was put in place that would alter (and lower) greenhouse gas emissions. The Exxon engineers thought that the detection of the upward temperature deviation would likely happen around the year 2000, or eighteen years from the date of their internal report. As mentioned above, Michael Mann's 'hockey stick' paper doing just that was published in 1998, indicating that climate effects were slightly greater than the Exxon engineers had predicted.

It's taken me a while to get around to it, but I did manage to estimate Exxon internal model values based on their graph using an online plot digitizer service. I pulled CO2 and temperature change actuals from NOAA, so I have a couple of graphs generated based on those.





Overall, I think the Exxon engineers did a heck of a job back in 1982. Of course, they did that job in the service of evil, but there is no denying that they worked up the numbers well, and have predicted with chilling accuracy the future path we still are on.
Posted by: Henry J on Nov. 28 2022,15:15

Somebody needs to figure out how to make fusion self sustaining.
(Well, that or invent something better. )
Posted by: Henry J on Mar. 26 2023,15:19

Bog, watch yer langwitch!
Posted by: Henry J on May 09 2023,07:49

NYET!
Posted by: k.e.. on May 15 2023,05:28

Quote (Henry J @ Nov. 28 2022,23:15)
Somebody needs to figure out how to make fusion self sustaining.
(Well, that or invent something better. )
---------------------QUOTE-------------------


Actually that's called the sun. We won't run out of Silicon (as PV panels) or Lithium (battery storage)  before we convert enough photons into stored electrons for 24/7/365 electrical power world wide  deprecating the eon already spent trying to solve the confined  fusion problem. It's a no brainer. The fossil fuel industry is talking up stored???  CO2 stripped from hydrogen as a green alternative. Adjust your stocks they are dead meat.
end


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