Climate change could mean the extinction of our species

[Ben]

Article by Paul Craig Roberts. Who was the: Assistant Secretary of the Treasury in the Reagan administration.

http://www.paulcraigroberts.org/2012...spring-for-us/

[Ben]

Rex Tillerson, Chairperson and CEO of ExxonMobil, admits global warming is real. A big step for the giant energy company. But he says we can adapt. But say we can't. What then???
Plus how do we sustain perpetual growth -- endless production and consumption -- on a finite planet? How can we keep growing, as it were, into the future. I mean, can we sustain this level of production and consumption 100 years from now? What about 1,000 years? What about 5,000 years? Or do we simply say future generations have no value.
As Noam Chomsky has stated: corporations, by their very design, have an INSTITUTIONAL IMPERATIVE to destroy the planet.
And this goes back to perpetual growth. Which is built into the corporate structure. Corporations have to keep growing. I mean, GM has to keep producing more and more cars. It has to.
There are 800 million cars in the world. What happens when China decides they want, say, a billion cars. What then?
You simply cannot sustain, again, a system based on infinite growth, infinite consumption and production. It's physically impossible.
But Tillerson is only concerned about the next quarter, the next 3 months. And has to be. That's his institutional role. Therefore his kids and grandkids have no value. But he isn't a bad person. It has nothing to do with the people. It's the institution.
Same thing applies to, say, government.... It's not the people. It's the structure.

[Stavros]

Rex Tillerson, Chairperson and CEO of ExxonMobil, admits global warming is real. A big step for the giant energy company. But he says we can adapt. But say we can't. What then???
Plus how do we sustain perpetual growth -- endless production and consumption -- on a finite planet? How can we keep growing, as it were, into the future. I mean, can we sustain this level of production and consumption 100 years from now? What about 1,000 years? What about 5,000 years? Or do we simply say future generations have no value.
As Noam Chomsky has stated: corporations, by their very design, have an INSTITUTIONAL IMPERATIVE to destroy the planet.
And this goes back to perpetual growth. Which is built into the corporate structure. Corporations have to keep growing. I mean, GM has to keep producing more and more cars. It has to.
There are 800 million cars in the world. What happens when China decides they want, say, a billion cars. What then?
You simply cannot sustain, again, a system based on infinite growth, infinite consumption and production. It's physically impossible.
But Tillerson is only concerned about the next quarter, the next 3 months. And has to be. That's his institutional role. Therefore his kids and grandkids have no value. But he isn't a bad person. It has nothing to do with the people. It's the institution.
Same thing applies to, say, government.... It's not the people. It's the structure.

1) BP acknowledged the human element in climate change in 1997, followed soon after by Shell and some other independent oil companies; Tillerson's predecessor, Lee Raymond probably didn't believe in it but was advised at the time that admitting a role in climate change would make Exxon liable to prosecution in the US by environmentla groups. That Exxon has followed the other independent oil companies isn't news; you keep banging on about it and getting it wrong every time.
The real issue is not climate change per se, but the policies being introduced to regulate/reduce carbon emissions. BP was instrumental in developing the concept of carbon trading in the European Union, but additional taxes are what corporations want to avoid.

2) When you say:
Plus how do we sustain perpetual growth -- endless production and consumption -- on a finite planet? How can we keep growing, as it were, into the future. I mean, can we sustain this level of production and consumption 100 years from now?
-You don't seem to be aware that production and consumption are in decline and that this is one reason so many people are unemployed. It happened before when there was a dramatic fall in demand for industrial goods in the late 1970s and 1980s, so there is no perpetual growth but cycles of growth, stagnation, decline and growth again, one hopes. You also take no account of how innovations in modern industry make production more efficient.

3) Finally when you say this:
As Noam Chomsky has stated: corporations, by their very design, have an INSTITUTIONAL IMPERATIVE to destroy the planet.
What planet are you living on? Can you not think through this to realise how plain stupid Chomsky can be? Just because he says something doesn't make it so, corporations need customers in markets, committing corporate suicide isn't usually a priority over that.

[Ben]

Published on Saturday, July 7, 2012 by Common Dreams 'Staggering': 4,500 Heat Records and Counting


As globe warms, the rate records are being broken can't be explained away by coincidence

- Common Dreams staff

A heatwave that began weeks ago in the western Rockies before spreading to the midwest with sweltering temperatures and monstrous thunderstorms, has continued eastward leaving records highs, loss of life, and intense weather events all along the way. Heat records have been smashed in over 4,500 locations, and with Saturday temperatures showing no relief, that number is expected to grow.
Looking at midwestern temperatures across the region, the Weather Underground blog cites records set in Michigan, Illinois, Indiana, and Pennsylvania. "On Friday," writes Jeff Masters, "three cities in Michigan [hit] their hottest temperatures ever recorded. Lansing hit 103°, the hottest day in Michigan's capital city since record keeping began in 1863."
The National Weather Service said the temperature also hit 103° at O'Hare International Airport on Friday, breaking the record of 99 degrees set in 1988, and making it the third-straight day with a triple-digit reading in Chicago.
Lack of electricity also is compounding the misery for many following storms that knocked out power in Michigan, West Virginia, Maryland, and elsewhere.
Jane Lubchenco, head of the US National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), on Friday said that the experience of recent extreme weather has convinced many Americans previously unconvinced or unconcerned with the impacts of man-made climate change.
“Many people around the world are beginning to appreciate that climate change is under way, that it’s having consequences that are playing out in real time and, in the United States at least, we are seeing more and more examples of extreme weather and extreme climate-related events,” Lubchenco told a university forum in the Australian capital of Canberra.
“People’s perceptions in the United States at least are in many cases beginning to change as they experience something first-hand that they at least think is directly attributable to climate change,” she said.
"It's OK to talk about events when you discuss them in a proper scientific context," says Michael Mann, director of the Earth Science Center at Penn State. "The climate models have predicted what we've now seen, which is a doubling in the rate at which we break all-time warmth records in the U.S. We're breaking those records, over the past decade, at a rate of almost twice what we would expect from chance alone."
In fact, more than 2,000 U.S. heat records were broken just in the past week. Climatologists argue that while there's certainly nothing unexpected in periodic record-breaking temperatures, the rate at which these records are being broken year after year can't be explained away by coincidence.
"There's a randomness to weather, but what we're seeing is loading of the weather dice to the point where sixes are coming up 10 times more often," says Mann. "If you were gambling and you saw sixes coming up 10 times more often you'd start to notice. We are seeing climate change now in the statistical loading of these dice."

[Ben]

[Ben]

More good news on the Climate Change front -- ha ha ha! The concern now should be so-called runaway climate change.
Some fairly twisted scientists have suggested we "move" the Earth. Oooookay. That'll be fun -- ha ha! Actually, I'm looking forward to that. The simple solution: stop burning fossil fuels never crosses their minds because the energy industry is just too darn powerful.
And, too, their institutional interests are short-term. And have to be. I mean, Rex Tillerson, CEO and chairperson, of Exxon is only thinking about himself, his sizable wallet, his net worth. It's called: being rational. He is a very rational actor.
But what happens in 50 years, 60, 70 or 80 years, well, who cares. I got mine jack.
It's difficult to criticize how rational this is. Because it is rational. And that's why it frightens me.
I think it was George Carlin who wished future generations: good luck. 'Cause they're gonna need it.

[Ben]

Are climate sceptics more likely to be conspiracy theorists?

New research finds that sceptics also tend to support conspiracy theories such as the moon landing being faked:

http://www.guardian.co.uk/environmen...sts?intcmp=122

[trish]

Climate skeptic changes mind ->
http://www.nytimes.com/2012/07/30/op...?smid=pl-share

Berkeley Earth Temperature Project->
http://berkeleyearth.org/

[Ben]

Climate skeptic changes mind ->
http://www.nytimes.com/2012/07/30/op...?smid=pl-share

Berkeley Earth Temperature Project->
http://berkeleyearth.org/

And, again, even the likes of Rex Tillerson, CEO and Chairperson of Exxon-Mobil, came out, as it were, and said global warming is real. But said we could adapt.
I'm guessing that's their new line of defense. Whereby Oil, Coal and other Energy giants will simply say: Yes!, global warming is real but we can adapt. We've the ingenuity and technology to adapt to what nature throws our way. Well, we better start right now.
Bill McKibben (it's with an e) talks about the power of the oil industry...

[Ben]

Stop this culture of paying politicians for denying climate change

Protecting the environment requires a sweeping reform of political funding, only then corporations will stop throwing big money at senators:

http://www.guardian.co.uk/environmen...cal-funding-us