Is there ANYBODY in the world that still denies the severity of global warming?

[spartak]

Who? Surely not Ming?

[MrWhereItsAt]

I'm a modern, liberal, pro-Conservation, anti-pollution kinda guy. Hell, I live in NEW ZEALAND - the country where, if you don't believe in anti-pollution measures, you are dead. I thought global warming was a very real, provable kinda phenomenon, until strangely I needed to write an essay on it in French at my final university year. In my researches, I found reports that the average global temperature had increased by something like 0.0001 degress in 30 years. Hardly conclusive evidence of global warming. Furthermore, the global CO2 levels had increased, but not nearly by as much as at other times throughout geological history, in records from ice cores out of Greenland.

Call me crazy, but in scientific matters such as this, I like to look at scientific evidence. Assuming I wasn't lied to in three separate journals, I have been convinced that global warming. although not ruled out, is unprovable from such evidence.

[Vanguard]

This is funny. Okay, I'll agree with the Anti-treaty people's argument that science cannot prove that global warming is occuring. The climate system is just too complex to allow good prediction of long term trends.

But economic systems are also too complex to predict things accurately. Yet you anti-treaty guys seem to have no trouble believing the doom and gloom cost predictions that you toss around. Why is this? How are you sure that the move to new technologies and enhanced efficiencies won't pay for the whole cost of the switchover---- with a huge bonus?

Let me state this reducio ad absudum a little more formally. Your argument, in a nutshell, is: "Science can't prove that global warming is occuring and even if it is, it may not be bad." Okay fine. So an equally valid argument would be: "Economics can't prove that Kyoto has any costs and even if it does, those costs may be offset by great benefits." Right? Right.

And, if you believe that the lack of certainty about global warming means that global warming is nothing to worry about, then surely you should also believe that the lack of certainty about costs means that costs are nothing to worry about. After all, we could end up making money on the deal, just as global warming might prove to be a good thing.

So, by your own reasoning, Kyoto doesn't do anything. But it doesn't cost anything either. So why doesn't the US sign it just to be friendly?


Hurts a little, getting hit by a big stick of logic, doesn't it?

[frostycreep]

Everyone here dosent even see global warming as a problem. Well there are a couple of holes in the o-zone layer, thats proven. What if we burned the whole thing so it dissapeared, then surely something bad would happen! I think global warming is real and it will cause real problems in the world, in the future. But if America is researching into it like someone here has mentioned then at least they except that its a problem. Maybe the kyoto agreement does have flaws but i still think something has to be done. We cant adopt the attitude of 'well nothing bads happend yet so we might as well ignore it'.

[axi]

My ignore list just grew by 1. Frickin idiot.

Somebody please tell connorkimbro that ignoring a problem doesn't make the problem dissapear. The same happens with persons too.

More proof that this is just a moronic troll... I guess you didn't even bother to read YOUR own thread... If you had decided to actually discuss vs your senseless silly and anti american trolling, you would have taken the time to see that I had posted the following:
quote:



My POV on this subject is actually quite different.

The agreement is flawed. I wouldn't have signed it as currently written either. However, I would have stayed at the table to work out an agreement that wasn't flawed... and then, once a more realistic and non-flawed treaty was developed, I would cram it down the Senate's throat.




So stop trying to "guess" what people think or believe.
You are just proving that you have no debating skills, and that you are just blowing smoke.

You talk about truth... you wouldn't know truth if it slapped you across the back of the head... as proven by the fact that you didn't even bother to read through your thread before posting more moronic crap. To know truth, you need to at least look for it instead of just making it up.

I had read this post of yours. You made the hasty conclusion that I hadn't read it. I mentioned your POV. About the part about "staying on the negotiations table" this depends on what are you trying to make of the Kyoto treaty. If you want to really do something about the environment, of course you stay, but you negotiate a much broader treaty to be globally enforced. If OTOH you just want to make the treaty just another useless (and harmless) piece of paper, like I think Bush wants, then your strategy depends on the occasion. Bush figured out that he couldn't do anything to neutralise the treaty from inside, so he walks away.

And I was takling about "my own perception of the truth". If it is in contrast with your own perception, only discussion or solid facts can reconcile the difference.

[Adam Smith]

Originally posted by axi
And I was takling about "my own perception of the truth". If it is in contrast with your own perception, only discussion or solid facts can reconcile the difference.

Please see my several prior posts, to which you have not responded.

[Sprayber]

See boys and girls what happens when you dont take your medication? You slip into an Axi attack.


I'm not an expert, but hasn't the earth more or less been warming since that last ice age? Speaking of Ice ages. I recall several years ago when scientist warned that the earth could possibly slip into another ice age since all available data suggested that we were in between ice ages. Does anyone remember that from the 80's? That was before everyone got into the Warming Earth theory. I think it's kind of like one months eggs are good for you and the next month they are bad. They just can't seem to make up their damned minds.

[Ming]

Originally posted by axi
And I was takling about "my own perception of the truth". If it is in contrast with your own perception, only discussion or solid facts can reconcile the difference.

What... your "perception" of the truth that I don't care, even though I had provided proof to the contrary...

Another example of your Flawed Perception... maybe you should take a class or two on perception, because yours sucks...

[connorkimbro]

no, not ming, axi. i'm tired of my bandwidth being wasted by his drivel.

[Vanguard]

John Miller: [quote]Actually this is extremely untrue. Global Warming has no chance of doing this, none at all.

Now there might be some chance of it ending human life on this planet, but even that is probably about as big as the chance caused by you sneezing (ie neglible).[quote]

from global warming the earth's ballance will stay within the limits life can tolerate (do you have any idea what life can tolerate??)

the only thing which could end life on this planet would be something like the death stars weapon fired on us (or in fact anything which would heat our entire surface and atmosphere (the whole planet in fact) to a 1000 degrees)

hell, an atomic war between the US and USSR in which all nuclear weapons were used could not end life on this planet

that is far more likely than global warming ending just human life (as I said, there is no chance (not even .000000000000000000000000000000001%) for global warming to destroy all life on this planet)

I have admitted that current climatological science cannot positively prove whether or not global warming is going on. But then what are these assertions of yours based on? Not climatological science, certainly, since we all agree that it can't prove much about the long term effects of CO2 emissions. So all this is nothing more than wishful thinking and hot air.

For what it is worth, I will once again state that the chance of a runaway greenhouse effect destroying all life on Earth is slight. But this scenario seems to have a lot more scientific basis than your assertions. And regardless of the chance of a greenhouse doomsday, global warming still seems likely to be A Very Bad Thing.

Wraith:

Yeah. It means that the warming they're predicting for 2100 would happen about four year later. The cost of this is uncertain, but estimates seem to range from high to extremely high

Which is it? Is climatologic science so imprecise that we have no idea whether or global warming is happening or not? Or is it so precise that we know that the exact effects of Kyoto will be slight one hundred years from now.

If climatology is imprecise then global warming could also be much worse than we think it is. After all, not even the most alarmist eco-nut predicted that the Ross ice shelf would collapse. Yet it has.

If this is the case then the sooner we do something the better. Cost is irrelevent.

If on the other hand climatology can predict precisely what the CO2 levels will be a century from now, then it is only prudent to rely on the best evidence available-----that global CO2 levels are rising to historic levels, that CO2 contributes to warming and that global temperatures are likely warming.

In this case, we will have to make the changes Kyoto mandates anyway at some point. Cost is not irrelevent, but since the costs of Kyoto will probably be basically the same (as a percentage of GDP) whether we make them now or fifty years from now, it makes good sense to make them now. That way will get the maximum ecological benefit and be no worse off otherwise.

--------------

The fact that you are uncertain of the effects your actions does not mean that your best choice is to do nothing. When you are not certain of a course of action, you should generally try to move in the direction of Goodness and away from Badness.

In this case, it appears clear to me that higher CO2 emissions go in the direction of Badness. And more efficient energy consumption and decreased emissions seemingly cannot be anything but Goodness.

Costs, of course, are always Bad. But there are costs in both decision trees. Just because you can pretend to measure the costs of the Kyoto branch as "200-300 billion dollars a year" does not mean that those costs are lower than the inestimable branch that includes such results as submerging half of the world's cities.

So, overall, we should move in the direction of Goodness-----less emissions.

[connorkimbro]

lemme sum up.

We think something may be happening.

In addition, there is a slight possibility that it could be very very bad.

Therefore, let's spend ****LOADS of money attempting to prevent it, and hope that it works.

...

that's basically the message i'm getting.

[Sirotnikov]

Axi, perhaps I would be working on wrong assumptions - in which case i appologize - but i imagined you were linked to atleast some extreme lefty information sources on the web.

i remember you quoting some such things on apolyton in previous years.

now i read some of those (israel has those as well) and they are pretty wild in concepts of fact and fiction.

not to mention that when you supply a theory to go with the facts, you make the reader believe the theory easier.

just like i was taught to believe in israel and zionism.

[Ned]

Correct me if I am wrong, since what I know about Kyoto is from reading news reports, etc., but the worst poluters, India and China, seem to be exempt or have less stringent obligations. If this is true, then for this reason alone the United States probably will not support Kyoto.

But beyond that, what enforcement mechanisns are there? Let us assume for the sake of argument that China does not comply with its treaty obligatons. What is the remedy?

[Imran Siddiqui]

Looking at Europe, especially Prague, I can't imagine that someone could NOT believe in Global Warming and the horrors it can cause.

[KrazyHorse]

Originally posted by optimus2861
Actually, the drought in Western Canada isn't unprecedented; there was a far worse drought in the 1930s that turned the Prairies into a big dustbowl.

I've heard it said (on two separate occasions, on CBC broadcasts, no less) that in absolute environmental terms, the current drought is twice as bad as that of the 30s already. The only thing which has prevented us from seeing the same impact onfarm production is that the technology (specifically irrigation?) implemented on farms is much better now than 70 years ago.