Uh oh another one jumps ship

[Skull]

Are you really unaware of the NOW effects of global warming? Already severe in some area...

I'm sorry Don but what exactly are the NOW effects of global warming??? Got some examples ...

 

[trigfunctions]

Is it a good idea to cap US crabon output and potentially cripple the economy...

This is the type of hyperbole that effectively kills any reasonable debate on this topic. It's all-or-nothing, black-or-white, with-us-or-agin'-us, and by those rules, nothing will ever be done until it is way too late.

Luckily, you folks are in the minority on this one, and the rest of us might be able to accomplish something useful despite your protests to wait for more data.

 

[trigfunctions]

Sceptics will debate if smoke means fire until the building is burnt to the ground.

GREAT LINE!

 

[trigfunctions]

Trig and if the 90 doctors were in the pockets of Merc, Pfiser, Bristol Myers then what? ...

Yeah - all them fancy pants climatologists getting filthy rich off their research studies, buying them expensive tweed jackets with the patches on the elbows and stroking their finely groomed beards - they're just like those Enron and Chevron executives.

 

[jefffalcone]

This presumes, once again, that human carbon emissions are even a problem.

The drive to fuel efficient cars is good, but it has nothing to do with global warming. It has to do with the price of fuel. People will buy cars according to how cheaply they can be bought and run, not according to how carbon neutral they are.

Exactly how do "alternative energy sources" enhance my lifestyle? Right now, burning gasoline and using coal-derived electricity is pretty easy for us...exactly how will windmills and solar panels make our lifestyles any better? I am not saying that going to nuclear or fusion power would not be a good thing, but I don't see the connection to lifestyle, unless the energy is cheaper.

Our lifestyles require energy that is 1) plentiful 2) cheap 3) non-polluting. If one subtracts carbon dioxide from the equation, oil fits the bill perfectly. Thanks to modern automotive technology, a 2007 car gives off less pollution at full throttle than a 1965 car did JUST SITTING IN THE GARAGE giving off fumes from its gascap. If the US were to tap its northern reserves, we would have enough oil to last for centuries. Like diamonds, oil is only expensive because geopolitical forces make it so.

I believe that GW is a concoction of people who HATE big oil for some irrational reason. And people who have a vested interest in alternative energy. Given the recent lack of major oil spills, the removal of lead and carcinogens from gasoline, and the near vanishing of any significant air pollution, the anti-oil crowd had to turn on the ONLY thing that oil use produces right now and that's CO2.

Think about it. If human produced CO2 proves NOT to be a problem, what environmental hammer is left to drub EXXON with? Given that the world is AWASH in oil (if we choose actually to drill for it, rather than let it sit under useless tundra), and given that the modern combustion engine has been made SO clean that it produces only carbon dioxide and water vapor, the alternative energy industry would vanish if were shown that CO2 is harmless.

As further proof that GW is about hating big oil, why the drive for electric cars? Charging them still produces C02, since most US electricity is generated by burning coal, which is, in some ways, dirtier than burning gasoline (and mining is more harmful than drilling). But no one has a beef with "big coal", only "big oil". Why?

What makes me most mad about the GW thing is how politicized science has become. Once science is full politicized, there will be no havens of rationality left in the world.

I think it would be great if we were to harness fusion or hydrogen fuel cell technology. Oil is good, but not ideal. But jumping over immediately to poorly developed, expensive and inefficient technologies that clearly lack the capacity to sustain our present energy use (like solar, wind, ect) based upon alarmist predictions is not warranted right now.

Where are you getting your information? I have never read anywhere that there is an abundance on untapped oil reserves. In fact, one of the main arguement against drilling for oil in Alaskan wildlife reserves is that it won't sugnificantly increase our oil supply. I have heard that some believe that there are significant undiscovered oil reserves, but this is hardly fact, and to state that the world is awash with oil as if it is fact is nonsense.

Also wind power is a well developed and well understood technology. The only cost involved is building and maintaining the windmills. Once they are there, the power is free. You are right that solar is currently expensize, and inefficient, but the expense is largely due to lack of mass production. There are also promissing developments in solar power that might significantly improve it's efficiency.

No one thinks that we can get rid or our dependance on oil and coal tomorrow, but attitudes like yourse will prevent change until it is too late. Changing over to renewable, clean energy, is an enormous undertaking that will take a very long time. We need to start now, if we want to stop using oil ever.

Even if you believe that there is an abundance of oil, like all natural rescources, it is limited. On the other hand, things like sunlight and wind seem to be fairly limitless. Let's not forget that at one time it looked like there were so many trees that lumber was limitless. Anybody who's noticed the price of lumber recently knows that this isn't true.

 

[jefffalcone]

The anti GW crowd drive me nuts. The arguement is basically, because there is some chance this isn't really happening we should do absulutely nothing about it. We can continue to go to war to protect our oil interests. We can continue to drive insanely large vehicles to impress our neighbors. We can continue to polute and waste, because it is profitable.

 

[Lopaka]

I'm sorry Don but what exactly are the NOW effects of global warming??? Got some examples ...

Hysteria?

Kidding aside, the biggest problem is the politicizing of the issue. That closes minds on both sides to any sort of rational study. Too bad some have used this for their own political ends, instead of truly wanting to help the environment. It has poisoned the discussion, perhaps irretrievably.

 

[Kim]

Look, believe what you want, but the GW crowd wants to control MY life.

So I take it that you are also anti smoking legislation?

To be frank - just as all the passive smoking arguments did it for tobacco - I think while your lifestyle and pollution causes more than necessary problems for everyone elses living environment as well as your own, others have absolutely the right to point it out - and if you won't change, penalize you for it.

You might not be able to legislate against selfish, self-centered attitudes - but you can make them very expensive to maintain. It has worked pretty good against tobacco.

 

[shakeybrainsurgeon]

Sceptics will debate if smoke means fire until the building is burnt to the ground.

In my humble opinion we don't have time for that. At this point we are better off to assume we have a serious problem. We will now thank the sceptics to leave the building and stand well out of the way while the people of action do something.

Frankly we're better off doing something and discovering after the fact that it wasn't necessary than we are to debate the issue ad nauseum until all we can do is accept the consqences.....

90% of everyone will stand around at an accident staring, making moo-ing sounds and giving commentary. I'm getting behind the 10% who want to step up to the plate.

R..

Unfortunately, to use your accident analogy, the basic environmental activist's approach to the accident scene would be to go around to the other spectators, take money out of their wallets and give it to the victim in the guise of personal charity. If you want to drive smaller cars, take bicycles to work, sit in the dark and chant kumbayah or whatever, be my guest. But your "stepping to the plate" I suspect will mean stepping on a lot of other people's toes.

And what about recreational diving... I mean, any SERIOUS activist would NEVER EVER burn a single OUNCE of diesel fuel to satisfy that luxury. I hear people moaning about somebody buying an SUV, yet riding big dive boats out to some reef for a HOBBY can be justified? Oh, your love of diving is OK, but some other guy's love of a big car is greedy? Everybody wants to save the world, until the things THEY love get affected. Who on this board will here and now swear to give up diving to save the earth? The best part about my position is I don't have to give up anything!

The fact that the Kyoto treaty exempted China and India says it all --- if the world was REALLY going up in flames, why exempt anyone at all? I mean, if we are all doomed, why in blue blazes would we allow the second (and soon to be the first) biggest culprit off the hook? Cutting the Us and Europe down to size would have nothing to do with it I suppose?

 

[Kim]

CONSERVATION is what needs to be practiced.
Nuclear Power needs to be expanded BIG TIME in the US

Agreed.

Stop buying products from Dirty Countries...ie....CHINA

You might want to be careful with that one - the US is the biggest polluter, i.e. "Dirty Country", in the world still. Has been for a long time.