Kyoto Protocol on greenhouse gases takes Effect

[drbill]

Bill,
They are only the facts you choose to believe. When you ask for expert input, you only want input which already agrees with what you believe, not facts.
Let's go back a couple of centuries. What methods of obtaining temperature data were there? Not as sophisticated as the methods of today. So how can you use old data and new data to come to any conclusion?

One does not need to rely on data collection using technology from 100-200 years ago. One need only use consistent methodology on data recorded over time... such as in ice cores, tree rings, etc. These data are comparable because they use the same methodology over periods of historic or geologic time. If enough different data collection methodologies in different areas of the globe produce a fairly consistent result world-wide, that should be enough evidence to at least act.

What "facts" using such consistent technologies and methodologies contradict what has been acquired this way? There may be some, and I'm just not aware of it.

Decades ago I intuitively determined that living adjacent to expressways and major surface arteries in Los Angeles would be detrimental to my health for a number of reasons. Data were later acquired from Europe to validate my intuitive assumption. However good data for linking proximity to roads and disease probabilities in LA was only recently evaluated and, of course, I was right. Glad I chose to live in areas away from such major transportation corridors over the past three decades rather than wait for these data.

Dr. Bill

 

[dlndavid]

Duh,
It's like a jogger jogging along a main roadway, you don't have to be a rocket scientist to figure that out. Hello, can we say exhaust. :11:

 

[Kim]

Duh,
It's like a jogger jogging along a main roadway, you don't have to be a rocket scientist to figure that out. Hello, can we say exhaust. :11:

So how come you can't equate that exact example with industrial exhaust on a global scale? Seems fairly similar to me.

 

[dlndavid]

Cancer and global warming similar? Hmmmm? Nope.

 

[Mako Mark]

What methods of obtaining temperature data were there? Not as sophisticated as the methods of today. So how can you use old data and new data to come to any conclusion?.

Sorry David, I have to side with Bill here, while you are right about data collection 100 years ago, there are records such as ice cores, O16/O14 isotope ratios from deep ocean sediments, tree rings and paleopallinology that can give accurate correlations of temperrature over both short and long time frames.

While you are right, this is not data, it is inferred data or correlations, and I think this is the base of where the argument over whether they are "facts" comes from.

The other issue that is very difficult to resolve is the causal relationship. We know climate is cyclic, separating abnormal fluctuations from normal fluctuations and then trying to assign a causal relationship is highly problematic and spectulatory.

But that unfortunately is the nature of science, we cant prove anything, only disprove things: The null hypothesis..

One of the greatest examples of this is that we cannot prove that humans or life is "organic" or any different from an inanimate object such as a rock.

What we can prove is that we are not inanimate, but by default this means that the very chemical reactions that occur in a rock, are no different form the ones that occur in a life form, except on a vastly more complex scale. What this proves is that we cant prove that a rock is not alive..


It is a conundrum.

 

[drbill]

Duh,
It's like a jogger jogging along a main roadway, you don't have to be a rocket scientist to figure that out. Hello, can we say exhaust.

Then why did it take the government and scientists so long to get the facts out in the case of roadways and illness? Of course the European studies were decades ahead of the LA ones. Do you (literally) smell "special interests?" In the case of greenhouse gases do you smell the same thing? I do.

Dr. Bill

 

[dlndavid]

Then why did it take the government and scientists so long to get the facts out in the case of roadways and illness? Of course the European studies were decades ahead of the LA ones. Do you (literally) smell "special interests?" In the case of greenhouse gases do you smell the same thing? I do.

Dr. Bill

Governments are not efficient. Period.

 

[archman]

I thought the facts were fairly well accepted that global warming is occuring over relatively short time frames (1-2 centuries). I think the interpretation of the causes is what is being debated. "Global warming" as I understand it is a fact. The cause is still subject to interpretation. Any one with more expertise in this area care to comment?

I have "indirect expertise" as I have to listen to various climatologists yammer about this just about every week. And you're right Bill, most of them accept that global warming is taking place. The difficulty really only lies in figuring out it's scale and causes.

 

[cyklon_300]

edition of the journal Science has an article that describes the author's (Naomi Oreskes, Univ CA) summary of 928 peer-reviewed climatological studies performed during 1993-2003.

Read it and form your own opinions.

 

[doole]

So how come you can't equate that exact example with industrial exhaust on a global scale? Seems fairly similar to me.

For my part, I can.

I just can't equate it to the Kyoto Accord.