The Environment: Is it really that bad?

Yes, but mormally you would conisder the cost and benefits.
Now it seems like it's politicly incorrect to mention this.
What if constraints on growth or taxes on co2 costs more (for me, you or the poor) than the cost of climate change if we "do nothing"?

 

We seem to have two subjects going on at once here.
1. Climate Change
2. Polution.

Lets cover number one. And I'll go slowly.

The Earth was once covered with ice.

The Earth is no longer covered with ice.

Why?

Because of climate change.

Were human factories, cars, refrigerants from refrigerators or methane from the result of man eating baked beans.

No!! It all happened without man. Humans may think they are smart and think they can effect climate change but they can't.

The chances of man effecting climate change are as great as Cameron Diaz falling in love with me. Although she is with Justin Timberlake so she can't be that fussy.

Polution - Man is clever or stupid enough to effect his immediate well being, he can fish himself out of fish or poison them. Polute the ground water with chemicals and fill the sky with smoke.

Polution we can clean up. Climate change we can't control.
And Cameron, I love you.

 

Funny in this subject how so little knowledge can elicit opinions of such certainty.

As it seems I must.

I'll combine the two subjects:

If you allow that we are polluting the atmosphere, why the insistence that this pollution has no effect?

The polarization on this subject reveals more about the our political climate than the sky over head.

 

No, the two are quite separate... In every instance where polution has been stopped and nature left to its own devices, the efects have been reversed in time, sometimes as short as a decade or two. Anybody remember the Exxon Valdez? Well there was a section that Exxon had to pay to clean up and there was a section that was left alone. Humorously enough, the section that wasn't clean is now in better condition and has recovered further than the section that was cleaned by crews of tree hugging environmentalists...

Ain't that something. Earth is a system that constantly seeks equalibrium... just like our own bodies. When something upsets that balance, other parts are titled to reverse the effect. We've seen it time and time again. In fact, in situations where man tries to right the balance himself, we see it delaying the recovery in many cases.

And as a side note, not all pollution should be worried about... We've banned substances like CFCs and Halon because they damage the ozone... well thats a nice thought and all but your avg volcano puffing the ole cigar spits out more CFCs than every can ever made. And Halon, the most advanced firefighting tool known to man is banned to us commercial sailors. Why? because it damages the ozone... WHAT THE HELL? Do you guys think we just pop the fire suppression system for fun? That crap is expensive. How many fires do ships have every year in the engine room (where would are the very most likely to drop it and clear out instead of trying to fight it)? Not enough to even shake a stick at... and before you say that there are thousands of ships, I'll tell you right now the chinese, greeks, maltese, panamanians, etc etc are not gonna pay for this expensive system... their too cheap and their crews don't have the leverage to make the owners install it... You'd only see on American, maybe Japanese or British ships (if they ever got over their environ hissy fit) and since these three countries operate the safest ships in the world, fires are rare events.

Had to rant there.

 

(Ok I have to give a warning and apology. This is a long post. Sorry)

Something I learned very quickly in the global warming thread that I started (which I was actually more interested in the poll results than the arguments)
Was that it is largely pointless to argue this sort of thing online in an informal style.
If we are going to make these big claims and conclusions, then we really have to present our arguments with proper scientific and academic research and referencing.
I think Matt said it well:

But this is a boat design forum, not a scientific/academic forum.
So I am afraid that this may really asking too much (or more correctly- for it in the wrong area).
It is fair enough to expect the “boat design” theorizing here to be on a professional level with proper scientific and experimental research and referencing behind arguments and ideas-
But on climate change?
I think we are wasting our time.

Saying this, I realize that this thread is a pointless place for me to argue any of the numerous claims (in this thread so far) that I have objection to.
There are very valid arguments and debates to be made on the issues of anthropic induced climate change and environmental catastrophe (or not), and to how we should go about dealing with this certainty/uncertainty, and or calculating the costs/benefits- but from the majority of points so far, and the way they are presented, this is not the thread, nor the forum (IMHO) to do such.

Keep at it if you want- I don’t want to shut you guys down, (I realize this thread for what it is- a place where people sharing a similar ideology/mindset/mentality/opinion can get together and point out how ridiculous, biased and or stupid the ‘others’ are).
It is a normal and fun sort of thread- in the ‘open discussion’ forum, so it is fair game. Carry on and don’t mind me…

I am going to have my little rant, and then drop out, because really, I have better things to do with my time and effort than try to win such debate in such a place through such means.

The general ideas in this thread could be right…
I have dedicated my past and ongoing future studies and life (and hopefully career) to try to better understand certain specifics of these issues-
And I most fundamentally disagree with the general tone and argument of this thread (so far).
I may be right, I may be wrong-
Given the ramifications- I WOULD MUCH RATHER BE WRONG THAN RIGHT!

So far this thread has been a familiar tour through some of the many ‘climate change skeptic’ (urban myths?) arguments out there that flood the Internet and popular culture discourse.

The majority of these arguments are void, and (through considerable effort) mostly falsifiable, having no real controversy in the scientific and academic arena.

There are of course real arguments to be had out there, over the science and the conclusions and predictions from such, but these are arguments that would most probably go over most of our heads (me included) and be so technical and specific as to seem ‘hair splitting’ and ridiculously academic (and boring).

I will try to very briefly (and un-comprehensively) show one of the problems with one of the claims made.
This is regarding the claim that variations in the suns temperature or influence are responsible for global warming.
This is not one of the easy targets, and is actually one of the stronger areas where future advances in science could very potentially challenge the theory of anthropic climate change. (I don’t think it will)
This is why I picked it.
It is a real issue, that in this thread has been presented in a completely biased and simplistic way (with no evidence or references).

This first extract is a quick view into the scientific mumbo jumbo of investigating the relationship between solar activity and global climate changes.
Basically it goes over some of the difficulties involved in this science.
This sort of prediction is far from accurate at present.
This inevitably weakens any argument based upon solar influence for or against anthropic induced climate change.

from,
Edouard Bard and Martin Frank. 2006. Climate change and solar variability: What's new under the sun? Earth and Planetary Science Letters, Volume 248, Issues 1-2, 15 August 2006, Pages 1-14

So these guys draw the conclusion that the sun has passed “a large part of its history in calm phases, conceivably with an irradiance several % weaker than the present-day value.”

This is of course disputed by other research and other theories.
However some may agree with this conclusion, and then make other observations on top.

From,
Bumford, N. 2004. Does the sun influence climate change?(Quizzical). Geographical 76.12 (Dec 2004): 17(1).

So this position is accepting that the sun is in a ‘hot’ phase, but are pointing out that even this does not account for the last 30 years of warming.

This is one little disagreement with one of the common objections that has been raised here (with a skimpy two references).
We could no doubt argue for months about this point alone (as the scientific community has done and does far better than I could).
I can’t be bothered arguing anymore about this one, or about the rest.


Have fun convincing yourself that everything is A.O.K.
I sincerely hope that you are right.

Hans.

 

God isn't this subject exciting! So's peeing in a bucket - I know which one I prefer, mind you they both give relief when you've finished

 

http://www.nytimes.com/2006/10/12/s...&ex=1161316800&partner=MYWAY&pagewanted=print


Little wobble goes a long way? NY Times seems to have a study on its hands that says so.... interesting read and another example of how evidence and discoveries of all sorts happen everyday and these show us how little we really know about our climate.

 

Safewalrus,

I hear you . Its my day off, I've consumed several beers, and I know where my priorities are. Off to the head.

Take care.

TGoz

 

You want facts? I'll give you facts. These numbers are acknowledged by both sides, just not the conclusions. But it DOES NOT go over any one's head! It's in fact, rather simple:

FUN FACTS about CARBON DIOXIDE

(all excerpted from http://www.clearlight.com/~mhieb/WVFossils/greenhouse_data.html)

Of the 186 billion tons of CO2 that enter earth's atmosphere each year from all sources, only 6 billion tons are from human activity. Approximately 90 billion tons come from biologic activity in earth's oceans and another 90 billion tons from such sources as volcanoes and decaying land plants.

At 368 parts per million CO2 is a minor constituent of earth's atmosphere-- less than 4/100ths of 1% of all gases present. Compared to former geologic times, earth's current atmosphere is CO2- impoverished.

CO2 is odorless, colorless, and tasteless. Plants absorb CO2 and emit oxygen as a waste product. Humans and animals breathe oxygen and emit CO2 as a waste product. Carbon dioxide is a nutrient, not a pollutant, and all life-- plants and animals alike-- benefit from more of it. All life on earth is carbon-based and CO2 is an essential ingredient. When plant-growers want to stimulate plant growth, they introduce more carbon dioxide.

CO2 that goes into the atmosphere does not stay there but is continually recycled by terrestrial plant life and earth's oceans-- the great retirement home for most terrestrial carbon dioxide.


If we are in a global warming crisis today, even the most aggressive and costly proposals for limiting industrial carbon dioxide emissions would have a negligible effect on global climate!

Just how much of the "Greenhouse Effect" is caused by human activity?

It is about 0.28%, if water vapor is taken into account-- about 5.53%, if not.

This point is so crucial to the debate over global warming that how water vapor is or isn't factored into an analysis of Earth's greenhouse gases makes the difference between describing a significant human contribution to the greenhouse effect, or a negligible one.

Water vapor overwhelms all other natural and man-made greenhouse contributions. Water vapor, responsible for 95% of Earth's greenhouse effect, is 99.999% natural (some argue, 100%). Even if we wanted to, we can do nothing to change this.

Anthropogenic (man-made) CO2 contributions cause only about 0.117% of Earth's greenhouse effect, (factoring in water vapor). This is insignificant!

On the Kyoto agreement:

The Kyoto Protocol calls for mandatory carbon dioxide reductions of 30% from developed countries like the U.S. Reducing man-made CO2 emissions this much would have an undetectable effect on climate while having a devastating effect on the U.S. economy. Can you drive your car 30% less, reduce your winter heating 30%? Pay 20-50% more for everything from automobiles to zippers? And that is just a down payment, with more sacrifices to come later.

Such drastic measures, even if imposed equally on all countries around the world, would reduce total human greenhouse contributions from CO2 by about 0.035%.

This is much less than the natural variability of Earth's climate system!

While the greenhouse reductions would exact a high human price, in terms of sacrifices to our standard of living, they would yield statistically negligible results in terms of measurable impacts to climate change. There is no expectation that any statistically significant global warming reductions would come from the Kyoto Protocol.

" There is no dispute at all about the fact that even if punctiliously observed, (the Kyoto Protocol) would have an imperceptible effect on future temperatures -- one-twentieth of a degree by 2050. "


Dr. S. Fred Singer, atmospheric physicist
Professor Emeritus of Environmental Sciences at the University of Virginia,
and former director of the US Weather Satellite Service;
in a Sept. 10, 2001 Letter to Editor, Wall Street Journal


I can whack you with more facts if you want. The greenhouse gas theory to explain climate change is just not plausible. In science, if a hypothesis does not concur with the facts, we discard it in favor of one that does . Unless, of course we are talking about GLOBAL WARMING

 

interesting

 

"No, the two are quite separate... In every instance where polution has been stopped and nature left to its own devices, the efects have been reversed in time, sometimes as short as a decade or two."

You are not really making much of a point here

 

oh but it does.

 

Google Dr Singer and Exxon, you'll find this for instance:
http://www.exxonsecrets.org/html/personfactsheet.php?id=1

Just one example.
I don't mean Dr Singer is all wrong because he receives money from Exxon, but why did he deny it?

 

Global warmings caused by all you guys out there with your power boats shoving carbon monoxide into the atmosphere and peeing over the bow rail poluting the oceans.

This is backed by scientific data.

Heck scientists drivel so much crap there's gotta be one out there to back me up.

 

Poida - if these guys are belting around at a great rate of knots I'm sure peeing over the bowrail is not a good thing! would after all only get the stuff back inboard (like peeing to windward in a sail boat!) brings a whole new meaning to getting your own back! but at least your not polluting the ocean! Unlike little old ladies swimming in the sea! and have you seen what fish do in the stuff!