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Global Warming

Pauliesonne

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Pauliesonne
Joined
Jan 2, 2006
Messages
2,687
With all the hash/hash on both sides of the argument, I wanted to know what the general point of view was here on th JREF.

So...
 
It exists, no one will really take it seriously until it effects the economy or takes people's lives, we'll survive through it, and eventually we'll work to reverse it. When it comes down to it though, the Earth always goes through periods of warming and cooling. If anything, we need to realize how much of an effect we have upon the environment and take responsibility for it. Its not like we can leave after we've trashed the place. At least not right now.
 
bob_kark said:
It exists, no one will really take it seriously until it effects the economy or takes people's lives, we'll survive through it, and eventually we'll work to reverse it. When it comes down to it though, the Earth always goes through periods of warming and cooling. If anything, we need to realize how much of an effect we have upon the environment and take responsibility for it. Its not like we can leave after we've trashed the place. At least not right now.
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There has never been a global warming event while 7 billion people were hanging around. The effects on people will be magnified by the large populations of us.
 
Pauliesonne said:
With all the hash/hash on both sides of the argument, I wanted to know what the general point of view was here on th JREF.

So...
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Bah. Global warming is a myth. It says so, in black and white, in the latest scientific article/novel by Crichton, State of Fear.

No reasonable person could possibly read that and think that global warming was anything other than media fueled hysteria.
 
fishbob said:
There has never been a global warming event while 7 billion people were hanging around. The effects on people will be magnified by the large populations of us.
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That's assuming the conditions of last global warming events were the same.
 
When it comes to global warming, many of the so-called "sceptics" that post on this board have preferred to follow ideology instead of science.
 
Thanz said:
Bah. Global warming is a myth. It says so, in black and white, in the latest scientific article/novel by Crichton, State of Fear.

No reasonable person could possibly read that and think that global warming was anything other than media fueled hysteria.
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I've heard other people say that about that book, but I don't think it a myth. The description "media fueled hysteria" may be appropriate. My understanding is that global warming is occurring. The data available (or at least the stuff I've seen) seems pretty conclusive in that regard though admittedly I haven't gone beyond popular science articles.

Whether it is natural or human-caused is unknown. Whether it will continue is unknown. What impact it will have (beyond providing something for the media to get hysterical about) is unknown.
 
I'm with Beth, it's been ongoing since the Industrial Revolution. The implications of Global Warming are still being studied, but it's certainly happening. How much is do to human activity isn't conclusively known.

http://www.daviesand.com/Choices/Precautionary_Planning/New_Data/

Whether the ultimate cause of temperature increase is excess CO2, or a different orbit, or some other factor probably doesn't matter much. It could have been one or the other, or different combinations of factors at different times in the past. The effect is still the same. Nevertheless, the scientific consensus is that GTGs[greenhouse trace gasses] account for at least half of temperature increases, and that they strongly amplify the effects of small increases in solar radiation due to orbital forcing.

The graph below includes data from the Nature paper, plus data from other studies referenced below. Notice how CO2 concentration rises vertically at the end of the time series. The increase appears vertical because of the large time scale, but it actually occurs over the past 150 years, which corresponds to the age of fossil fuels (the modern industrial age). Notice too that there hasn't been a corresponding increase in temperature during this time period. This is probably due to the ability of the oceans to function as a heat sink, and thereby delay the increase in atmospheric temperatures. However, there are recent indications that the oceans are now warming, which will reduce their ability to act as a heat sink.
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There's a graph in there, I strongly suggest you take a gander at it.

The, "Every coastal city in the world is going to be underwater soon" thing comes from some estimation of how the ocean will behave as the world gets warmer. Even if the polar ice caps don't melt, liquid water, like most substances expands as it absorbs heat. Based on that alone, sea levels should rise. Again, it's a question of degree.

http://yosemite.epa.gov/OAR/globalwarming.nsf/UniqueKeyLookup/SHSU5BPHU8/$File/chapter3.pdf
 
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Beth said:
Whether it is natural or human-caused is unknown. Whether it will continue is unknown. What impact it will have (beyond providing something for the media to get hysterical about) is unknown.
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Evidence that humans significantly impact global warning is mounting. This according to Scripps researchers, emphasis added...

THE strongest evidence yet that global warming has been triggered by human activity has emerged from a study of rising temperatures in the oceans.

The rise in marine temperatures — by an average of 0.5C (0.9F) in 40 years — can be explained only if greenhouse gas emissions are responsible, research has shown. The results are so compelling that they should end controversy about the causes of climate change, one of the scientists who led the study said yesterday.

“The debate about whether there is a global warming signal now is over, at least for rational people,” said Tim Barnett, of the Scripps Institution of Oceanography in La Jolla, California. “The models got it right. If a politician stands up and says the uncertainty is too great to believe these models, that is no longer tenable.”
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article
 
Beth, Thanz is using that rhetorical technique known as sarcasm, I'm pretty sure.
 
Kullervo said:
Beth, Thanz is using that rhetorical technique known as sarcasm, I'm pretty sure.
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Oh okay. Sorry. Someone I know recently read the book and felt that it was quite convincing, well-researched and documented. I haven't read it myself.
 
Mycroft said:
Agreed.
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Mmm, this is not right...

Maybe I should make things clearer: the current consensus from the official scientific communities on climate change is that recent warming is largely human-caused.
 
Orwell said:
Mmm, this is not right...

Maybe I should make things clearer: the current consensus from the official scientific communities on climate change is that recent warming is largely human-caused.
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You think so? I've read up on the subject and while I can find individual scientists that go one way or another, I can't seem to find a consensus.

There is ideology both ways, however.
 
Mycroft said:
You think so? I've read up on the subject and while I can find individual scientists that go one way or another, I can't seem to find a consensus.
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You can't eh? Maybe you haven't looked hard enough. ;)
 
Mycroft said:
This is the part where you blow us all away with your brilliance by showing incontrovertable proof that you're right.
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Little Ice Age Chart

Look at the little red line at the year 1400. It keeps rising - a recovery from the black death - until it hits the year 1500. What happened then? The old world invades the new world and millions of people die. This causes a dramatic drop in population through disease and war in the new world resulting in the Little Ice Age. Afterwords a rising population forces temperatures even higher. If the Bird Flu kills billions of poor people in the third world then temperatures will again take a nose dive.

Global warming is people!
 
I though I would re-post this:

The web site I had originally copied this from is down now, for unknown reasons:

"The general theory that Global Warming is caused by the burning of fossil
fuels is wrong, wrong, wrong!

It is actually caused by all of the "Free Energy" "Perpetual Motion Machines" put into use by unscrupulous back yard inventors. The Free Energy created by these machines is eventually converted to heat, thereby warming the atmosphere. As opposed to conventional machines which only use the stored energy in the fossil fuels
and do not create their own waste heat. I'm sure that you have heard of
'water burning cars', generators that power themselves, 'crystal power' ?
And you've also heard the skeptics query; "If it works, how come the big
energy companies don't use it"? Well, they would, but a secret protocol
prevents them. These large companies are run by educated men who all realize
the hazards of global warming that usage on a grand scale would cause. Not
so the back yard tinkerer, whose short sightedness and self centered-ness
bring him to the decision "I'll get My free energy, world be damned!" Of
course, there are National Security and experimental exceptions too, that
could account for those suspicious items that some time show up as disc
shaped auras of excessive waste energy....

I'm currently doing research into the instrumentation required in a 'free
energy detector' that would allow me to pinpoint the location of these
sources of un-Godly heat. Seizure will be required in order to save our
Mother Earth from the hazards of Global Heat prostration and the inherent
heat pollution inherent in these anti-social machines. My earliest findings
are that all accoutrements in the vicinity of the detectors will have to be
colored black as other colors will interfere with the invisible emanations
given off by the infernal machines. Thus far I have only the most primitive
detector in use, steel rods bent at 90 degrees, which when held in the hands
if a specially trained operator, will swing wildly when in the presence of
the electro magnetic waves given off by those machines. It works well in
accompaniment with my directional accessory, a magnet suspended within a
liquid filled enclosure. And from personal experience, a copper bracelet
will protect the investigator from any harm caused by the electromagnetic
radiations wastefully given off by those machines, though I am currently
looking in to something called 'liquid metal' as an adjunct to the layers of
aluminum foil currently worn in my hat.. Looks like I'll have a lucrative
business in detectors, protectors, and directors. If you would like to get
in on the ground floor of such a lucrative business.............boy, that
black helicopter is awful noisy, why is he so coming in so "

Or maybe I should have re-posted this on the "what have you invented" thread?
 
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