Conservatives and climate change

[L.Y.S.]

What I don't get is what is the actual harm in switching to alternatives? Who does it pain besides the wealthy who benefit from non-renewables? This alone should send up red flags that both ends of the spectrum are about profit.

 

[lomiller]

Since the case for AGW depends on many different threads of evidence, the cases against that evidence are numerous. For example:...
Proponents of the AGW theory claim that recently observed warming is unprecedented.

Nope they say the rate of warming is unprecedented in human history.

Lets try to stick to claims that are actually being made.

Against this, critics offer the Roman warm period and the Medieval warm period.

neither of those periods is warmer than the last few decades, and of course the rate of warming/cooling was at least an order of magnitude slower than what is currently occurring.

Proponents assert that the Medieval warm period either did not happen or was localized to Northwest Eurasia (Europe).

Which "proponents" are you referring to? Certainly none of the mainstream climate scientists warning against the problem of global warming have made any such claims.

That said the preponderance of the evidence, and scientific opinion is that the Medieval warm period is misnamed and did not express itself globally as warmer temperatures. In fact changes in rainfall patterns are more common with only a few regions being notably warmer.

Some proponents of AGW (Mann, et. al.) used tree-ring data as proxy thermometers in constructing the hockey-stick graph. Steve McIntyre demonstrated that one of these reconstructions depended on very few samples and ignored an available, wider sample from the same area that moved the trend in the opposite direction

McIntyre's a blogger who managed to get a single paper published. His claimed were examined and rejected, and since then all he's done is re-post them on his blog to take in a new round of suckers.

With their behavior as revealed in the leaked UEA emails

There have been a half dozen investigations into these allegations, and all of them found they had no substance. Of course for people like you and Mhaze it's the 9-11 commission all over again, no amount of investigation or reports will ever assuage the CTers.


In fact at this point, they only people found to have lied, mislead or otherwise engaged in criminal activity

 

[johnny karate]

"One cannot discuss the value of the politics and policy issues surrounding the climate change without addressing the validity of the science supporting it".

Well, that's a complete and obvious lie. Consider for example, if an essay question was asked in a course on public policy. Say .... on the subject of "The Maldives".

• Student A blathers on about the effect of CO2 on the atmosphere.
• Student B discusses public policy and the Maldives.

Student A gets an F, Student B gets an A.

Next...

Other than the fact that the subject we're discussing is climate change and not the Maldives, you're hypothetical isn't at all silly and nonsensical.

If you want to discuss public policy regarding climate change, then the science surrounding climate change is a relevant topic.

Science-deniers, of course, don't want to have that particular discussion because all that "sciency stuff" threatens their ideology.

 

[Trakar]

Could anyone have shown the tangible benefits of strengthening the levees in New Orleans before hurricane Katrina hit?

Houston Chronicle 12/01/01
KEEPING ITS HEAD ABOVE WATER
New Orleans faces doomsday scenario
By ERIC BERGER
Copyright 2001 Houston Chronicle Science Writer
http://transcendent.us/static/200708/Early warning, 2001 - houston chronicle.pdf

“Operation Blue Roof” missions
in Florida, Alabama and Georgia
Engineering promotions
Hurricane emergency support
http://www.mvn.usace.army.mil/pao/Riverside/Sept-Oct_04_Riv.pdf

"Washing away"
- SPECIAL REPORT from THE TIMES-PICAYUNE
Five-Part Series published June 23-27, 2002
http://www.nola.com/hurricane/content.ssf?/washingaway/index.html

"The Creeping Storm"
Civil Engineering—ASCE, Vol. 73, No. 6, June 2003, pp. 46-55
http://cedb.asce.org/cgi/WWWdisplay.cgi?136899

"Gone with the Water"
October, 2004
http://ngm.nationalgeographic.com/ngm/0410/feature5/index.html

"Hurricane Risk for New Orleans"
September 2002
http://americanradioworks.publicradio.org/features/wetlands/hurricane1.html

"Hurricane Pam Exercise Concludes"
Release Date: July 23, 2004
Release Number: R6-04-093
http://www.fema.gov/news/newsrelease.fema?id=13051

"IEM Team to Develop Catastrophic Hurricane Disaster Plan for New Orleans & Southeast Louisiana"
(June 3, 2004)
http://www.iem.com/archived-press-r...ster-plan-for-new-orleans-southeast-louisiana


Understanding the problem, recognizing the risks and likely damages, and making plans to deal with these issues don't go very far if the people we elect to make the final decisions and enact such plans are in denial of these facts and incompetent at enacting the plans designed for those problems.

 

[johnny karate]

Understanding the problem, recognizing the risks and likely damages, and making plans to deal with these issues don't go very far if the people we elect to make the final decisions and enact such plans are in denial of these facts and incompetent at enacting them.

I'm sorry, but as mhaze has already pointed out to us, "sciency stuff" has no place in a discussion on public policy.

 

[lomiller]

CO₂ is a trace component of the atmosphere.

Fallacy of small numbers

. The theoretical relation between CO₂

The warming effect of CO2 isn't theoretical since it's derived deductively from the known physical properties of CO2 and various other physical laws like conservation of energy. "Theoretical" applies to things that have been arrived at inductively, not things arrived at deductively.

atmospheric temperature relies on assumptions about various feedback mechanisms.

Nope, the warming effect of CO2 stands on it's own and requires no feedback.

Of course the atmosphere does contain a number of feedback loops that control how much any radiative forcing (CO2, increased/decreased solar activity, changes in albedo, etc) will warm the planet. These are fairly well constrained by both the physics and the paleo-climate data. For example we know they are positive because a net negative value or even a too small positive value would make entering/exiting a glaciation impossible

. The predicted empirical relation between pre-historic CO₂ levels and prehistoric ambient surface air temperature is a hypothesis that needs empirical support.

And that support exists. In fact the effect of greenhouse gasses like CO2 are one of the main pieces that makes the climate history of the earth make sense, in much the same way the theory of Evolution allows the fossil record to make sense.

Tree rings do not serve as reliable proxy thermometers, for several reasons.

Baseless claim on your part. Dendrochronologists and the journals like Science and Nature that publish their articles obviously disagree with you.

 

[TimCallahan]

Restating the above question in plain english.

Mhaze, are you going to answer my question? I didn't notice that someone else had already answered it, and it didn't occur to me that it would immediately come up on a Google search. I need lots of help. After you help me, then I'll be better able to use my limited abilities to judge you, and judge the validity of your assertions. If I don't find enough stuff to be critical about, I'll just ask you more questions, okay? Oh, and I didn't notice that you didn't make any assertions, but just quoted a prominent scientist. I really need some help here.

<Serious> I'm sure you can see why I can't help but make fun of this stuff sometimes.

Okay, I missed AlBell's post (hilited):

It is from climategate, email #4141. All I've found though are blogs which I hesitate to link to.
Unfortunately, when I looked up the climategate blog, I couldn't find the e-mail in question. Thus, I still don't know the scientist - whom you could easily have named in your initial assertion. You have the choice of simply answering the question I asked or acting like a sarcastic jerk.

 

[W.D.Clinger]

And if you stick to discussion of politics and public policy issues related to climate, and not derail this thread into the sciency stuff, you'll be able to discuss the issues of the OP here just fine.

I join with mhaze in his condemnation of the derail attempted in post #5, when someone suggested it might not be easy to determine whether the Navier-Stokes equations are applicable to problems of fluid dynamics.

What generally accepted math, physics, chemistry, geology, biology, or economics does Freeman Dyson deny? Evidence?

I also agree with Malcolm Kirkpatrick that physicist Freeman Dyson is not a denier of science. He's a noted contrarian and subversive who describes himself as a heretic. Furthermore, Dyson accepts the reality of AGW even though he believes its importance has been exaggerated:

I will discuss the global warming problem in detail because it is interesting, even though its importance is exaggerated. One of the main causes of warming is the increase of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere resulting from our burning of fossil fuels such as oil and coal and natural gas.

What is Dyson's "political ideology"? I read a couple of his books some years ago and I have no idea. He does not seem particularly partisan to me.

Freeman Dyson regards himself as an environmentalist, but he regards environmentalism as more of a religion than a political ideology. From Dyson's review of two books on global warming:

Environmentalism has replaced socialism as the leading secular religion. And the ethics of environmentalism are fundamentally sound....Environmentalism, as a religion of hope and respect for nature, is here to stay. This is a religion that we can all share, whether or not we believe that global warming is harmful.

(ETA: As lomiller noted, I got Roger Pielke Sr confused with Roger Pielke Jr, so I have deleted that part of my post.)

Lubos Motl?

String theorist Luboš Motl is an AGW denier. He has expressed right-wing views, and has referred to himself as a "Christian atheist".

 

[Trakar]

CO₂ is a trace component of the atmosphere. The theoretical relation between CO₂ and atmospheric temperature relies on assumptions about various feedback mechanisms...

This is simply wrong.

The scientific understandings of CO2 and the greenhouse gas effect, are not merely speculated musings as you seem to be implying, they are well documented, carefully measured and routinely demonstrated facts. To state otherwise is to deny large sections of basic physics, chemistry and planetary science.

 

[lomiller]

I


Roger Pielke has disputed attempts to characterize him as a skeptic of AGW. He's more of a critic than a skeptic:


I don't know anything about Pielke's political or religious leanings.

FYI Malcome referenced Roger Pielke jr. npt Roger Pielke sr.

Jr's background is political science, which is normally done on behalf of right wing "think tanks"

Sr was indeed a publishing climate scientist 25 years ago, but hasn't published anything of note in more than a decade AFAIK and seems to be suffering from aging scientist syndrome, where a one prominent scientist refuses to let go of ideas his peers have passed by and ends up ranting about them in public forums instead of adding to the current debate

 

[balrog666]

"One cannot discuss the value of the politics and policy issues surrounding the climate change without addressing the validity of the science supporting it".

Well, that's a complete and obvious lie. Consider for example, if an essay question was asked in a course on public policy. Say .... on the subject of "The Maldives".

• Student A blathers on about the effect of CO2 on the atmosphere.
  
• Student B discusses public policy and the Maldives.

Student A gets an F, Student B gets an A.

Next...

 

[Trakar]

And if you stick to discussion of politics and public policy issues related to climate, and not derail this thread into the sciency stuff, you'll be able to discuss the issues of the OP here just fine.

Are you saying that politics and public policy should be made without concern or consideration to the relevent science facts that those policies are being designed to deal with? If you are willing to stipulate that the mainstream science of climate and the current climate change event is substantially accurate and sound, I'm perfectly willing to assist you in limiting the discussion to the policy addressments of the issues that science indicates needs to be addressed.

 

[AlBell]

Given that CO2 emissions need to be reduced, can we discuss economic and political policy to reach that goal?

'Substantially sound and accurate' is to be discussed in the moderated thread.

Ktkxbai

 

[BenBurch]

Except it isn't a reframe. It's directly from the OP. Want us to requote the OP for your benefit, or can you recall it yourself?

Doesn't make it an honest argument when you re-frame the intention of then OP to lawyer what is being discussed so that your denial of science has no bearing.

Since we are re-framing, I'm sure you will allow me to re-frame the OP;

Why do you conservatives feel the need to lie about science and evidence?

Is it ;

A. Just money because you love nothing more than money?
B. Your "garden of pure ideology" that need defense?

A or B; choose.

Since we are re-framing and all.

 

[Trakar]

Given that CO2 emissions need to be reduced, can we discuss economic and political policy to reach that goal?

'Substantially sound and accurate' is to be discussed in the moderated thread.

Ktkxbai

The scientific determination of how much CO2 emissions need to be reduced and within what time frame is essential to establishing viable and non-viable policy options. Technically this thread is about US conservatism's political flip flops on climate change science issues more than policy issues per se, but I would be happy to engage in a pure policy discussion that is in accord with the mainstream science climate change understandings.

 

[DC]

Given that CO2 emissions need to be reduced, can we discuss economic and political policy to reach that goal?

'Substantially sound and accurate' is to be discussed in the moderated thread.

Ktkxbai

we have a sort of tax for fossil fuels (diesel and gasoline excluded ) so the prices are a bit higher and people use them more carefully, the money is mostly given back to the industry and the population, a part is used to finance building upgrades to make them more efficient.

 

[AlBell]

Doesn't make it an honest argument when you re-frame the intention of then OP to lawyer what is being discussed so that your denial of science has no bearing.

Since we are re-framing, I'm sure you will allow me to re-frame the OP;

Why do you conservatives feel the need to lie about science and evidence?

Is it ;

A. Just money because you love nothing more than money?
B. Your "garden of pure ideology" that need defense?

A or B; choose.

Since we are re-framing and all.

Maybe you should start a thread; see if anyone other than lefty progressives is interested in that topic.

 

[AlBell]

The scientific determination of how much CO2 emissions need to be reduced and within what time frame is essential to establishing viable and non-viable policy options. Technically this thread is about US conservatism's political flip flops on climate change science issues more than policy issues per se, but I would be happy to engage in a pure policy discussion that is in accord with the mainstream science climate change understandings.

This is the right place: please do so.

 

[BenBurch]

Maybe you should start a thread; see if anyone other than lefty progressives is interested in that topic.

The question isn't for you, though. It's for MHaze who contorts anything he is asked in just the fashion I did there.

 

[AlBell]

Public forum, donchaknow?