Or not to watch. You couldn't pay me. Masochism.Quote:
Originally Posted by martin48
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Or not to watch. You couldn't pay me. Masochism.Quote:
Originally Posted by martin48
CDR Communications, the production company that made this film is part of the Cornwall Alliance via the James Partnership, an evangelical movement which campaigns against climate change science, you can read about it in these links -
http://thinkprogress.org/media/2010/...-evangelicals/
The imdb listing for CDR films-
http://www.imdb.com/name/nm4297552/?ref_=tt_ov_dr
Last month figures showed that since shops began charging 5 pence for a plastic bag, the trend suggests an 83% decline in the number of new plastic bags being taken out of the shop by customers. This remarkable statistic also suggests that apparently minor adjustments can have a major impact as long as the plastic bags we do have do not end up in the sea. A 5 pence tax is affordable, yet people will still try to avoid paying it by using and re-using bags they already own. This further suggests that modest measures to protect the environment can actually work, not impose a cost burden on consumers, and reward those trying to improve the environment with funds. I think that is a win-win situation. Another example would be for people with cars not to use them for short journeys that can be made on foot, for people who eat meat to consumer it only 3 times a week and thus reduce the need for herds across the world, and so on. But if we can go further to prevent paper bags in shops being used as an alternative to plastic bags (which I think are not common in the US -?), the long term impact on forests will also be beneficial, though we still use too much paper in other areas of life.
The BBC report on the story is here-
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-36917174
Nature , it's hammering , slowly but painfully (http://www.scientificamerican.com/ar...ear-on-record/)....,
(http://www.natureworldnews.com/artic...tists-warn.htm)
2500 years ago, AESCHYLUS said,"We learn nothing save thru suffering ,the pain of wisdom falls drop by drop upon the heart and sleep ,against our will comes wisdom , the grace of the god(s) is forced on us".
We must be hammered into pieces before we learn anything and be able to change. We are not capable of Rational thought.
Sorry Stavros, I think it's going to be really , really hard.
Of course Aeschylus was given to hyperbole and drama. A great deal of what we know we enjoyed learning. Euclid demonstrated that humans are indeed capable of rational thought. The problem is greed, desire and ego often short circuit reason.
Too pessimistic, Nitron, and it is not rational thought that is at fault, but irrational behaviour often not informed of the full range of options. If we can reduce the distribution of plastic bags by 83% in less than a year, we can achieve other environmentally friendly goals that do not cost a lot in terms of either cash or effort. I suspect the 5 pence tax has clarified it for people who otherwise 'can't be bothered' to re-cycle their trash or drive when they can walk. You don't even need to believe humans are causing advanced global warming to treat the environment with respect, but doing so could in the long term have more advantages than cynics like to claim.Quote:
Originally Posted by nitron
trish>"...humans are indeed capable of rational thought....",
moi>" people are capable of not reaching for the donuts,but..."
Rational thought vs irrational . Long term vs immediate .. Do we even have the time that's really needed to face our own instincts? We can't even admit that were risen apes.
Of course we have the time, if you don't run out the clock telling everyone that all action is for naught, you might as well party or the devil will save you. We save ourselves or we go extinct - our choice.
BTW: I didn't rise from Hominoidia, although we do share a common ancestor. But one doesn't have to subscribe to the modern evolutionary synthesis to be influenced by 5 pence charge per plastic bag to start using reusable canvas bags.
Advance notice of a book on the Arctic Death Spiral by Peter Wadham, which argues that as the ice-cap in the Arctic melts, and it is melting at around 13% a year, so the planet will carry on warming with devastating effect in parts of the world that will be uninhabitable due to the lack of water, food and in 50 degrees centigrade no shelter without air conditioning-
The warming now being widely experienced worldwide is concentrated in the polar regions and Wadhams says we will shortly have ice-free Arctic Septembers, expanding to four or five months with no ice at all. The inevitable result, he predicts, will be the release of huge plumes of the powerful greenhouse gas methane, accelerating warming even further.
He and other polar experts have moved from being field researchers to being climate change pioneers in the vanguard of the most rapid and drastic change that has taken place on the planet in many thousands of years. This is not just an interesting change happening in a remote part of the world, he says, but a catastrophe for mankind.
“We are taking away the beautiful world of Arctic Ocean sea ice which once protected us from the impacts of climate extremes. We have created an ocean where there was once an ice sheet. It is man’s first major achievement in re-shaping the face of the planet,” he writes.
Wadhams also offers man-made solutions to man-made problems-
But he joins other climate researchers to cross lines that the public may still find unacceptable. He wants global action to find new ways to remove carbon from the atmosphere, and is not afraid of nuclear power – both of which answers can be swallowed – but he also argues for a colossal, global research programme in geo- engineering.
This is the deliberate attempt to reduce warming by the planetary-scale manipulation of weather patterns, oceans, currents, soils and atmosphere to decrease the amount of greenhouses gases.
Spraying sun-reflecting chemicals into the atmosphere, mimicking volcanoes, blocking sunlight and fertilising the oceans with iron filings attracts people who think that technology has all the answers, but it should strike fear into most of the world, which has not been responsible for warming and which has no reason to trust politicians’ or scientists’ further meddling with planetary forces.
the full article is here-
https://www.theguardian.com/commenti...-peter-wadhams
I don't know if it is the species that is in danger or science and the reason through which it reaches its conclusions, but we can be sure that however many scientists dance on the edge of a pin, whatever these representatives of the 'expertariat' conclude is of no importance to the planet or the Trump administration, except of course, as a threat:
The environmental movement is “the greatest threat to freedom and prosperity in the modern world”, according to an adviser to the US president Donald Trump’s administration.
Myron Ebell, who has denied the dangers of climate change for many years and led Trump’s transition team for the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) until the president’s recent inauguration, also said he fully expected Trump to keep his promise to withdraw the US from the global agreement to fight global warming.
Ebell said US voters had rejected what he dubbed the “expertariat” and said there was no doubt that Trump thinks that climate change is not a crisis and does not require urgent action.
https://www.theguardian.com/environm...er-myron-ebell
An article in today's Guardian claims that the Trump Presidency will gradually devolve the powers of the Environmental Protection Agency to States until the EPA itself is wound up. What else will be wound up is a matter of debate and even though Myron Ebell, who led the EPA transition team- has said EPA research papers would not be dumped, he doesn't believe in the science of climate change.
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/...tection-agency
When the UK's Chief Scientist, Prof. David King said in 2004 climate change was a greater challenge than terrorism, Ebell responded by attempting to ridicule King as “an alarmist with ridiculous views who knows nothing about climate change”, a flippant dismissal of a distinguished academic who in reality knows more about climate change than Ebell. Indeed, King has now modified his comment on climate change:
"Climate change is not, in the Foreign Secretary's words, the biggest challenge of our time, it's the biggest challenge of all time."
How the US will meet this challenge is not clear, but one has the sinking feeling that science no longer matters. Even Ebell on tv last week could not hide his real concern, with the politics.
http://www.businessgreen.com/bg/blog...ge-of-all-time
As early as 2014 the U.S. military recognized our changing climate as a threat to national security. The armed forces are seeking to adapt their coastal installations against the threat of ocean rise, they are developing alternate power sources and integrating climate change, water shortages, climate related rescue operations etc. into their strategic thinking.
Wind is the fastest growing source of power in the U.S. Seven major oil companies, including BP and Royal Dutch Shell, are investing in renewables and encouraging others to fund steps to reduce the production and release of greenhouse gasses into the atmosphere.
Politically speaking, science was never much of a match against faith (religious or ideological) and faith was never much of a match against money. But this time, if we’re lucky, the money may be looking far enough ahead into the future to see that if it stays the current course, its coffers may get flooded with briny water rather than coin.
Meanwhile, in the U.S. We have Trump, Pence and Bannon in the White House with a cabinet that's filling up with retrogrades. We still have Inhofe on the Senate energy committee chaired by Lisa Murkowski of Alaska. Murkowski seems to rely on her own limited experiences rather than any scientific reading when she admits that Alaska is experiencing warmer temperatures and thinner ice and adds that those issues must be addressed. But she’s not sure humans can be blamed; she suggests volcanoes! The U.S. Geological Survey calculate the world’s volcanoes spew 200 million tons of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere per year, whereas all the world’s industries and automobiles cough 24 billion tons of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere annually- the anthropogenic emission is 120 fold more. Nevertheless Inhofe and Murkowsky are stuck, trying to analyze the situation with anecdotes from their own experiences - melting snowballs in the Senate chambers and the volcano Lisa can see at Katmai National Park.
Hope you guys can carry on without us for a few years. We’re going to be away for a little while. We’re taking a Sentimental Journey - back to a time when we were really ‘great’.
It does look as if the Trump Presidency regards environmental regulations as bad for business, as its repeal of the 'Stream Protection Rule' suggests. This repeal will give back powers to coal companies to blow the tops of mountains and dump the debris in streams and rivers. In the Appalachians thousands of natural water courses have been buried under rubble, but it does not mean this repeal will lead to a new golden age for coal, jobs and prosperity in some of the poorest communities in the USA.
But it does cement the power coal companies have at the expense of the people and the environment. A while ago I saw a report from West Virginia that asked why so many had voted for Trump, and at face value it was all about jobs. But an alternative voice pointed out that coal rules to the extent that workers receive low wages for long hours, pay rent to property owned by the company, shop in stores owned by the company, get their pension from the company, and when they die are buried in coffins purchased from the company. The land they live on is polluted, the water makes them sick, but they can do nothing about it.
One wonders why the US is even mining coal which is a dirty, inefficient and expensive product to extract, when there are trillions of cubic feet of low-to-neutral carbon reserves of gas to use instead. This repeal has as much to do with a philosophical loathing of 'the environment' as it is an endorsement of commercial firms trashing the natural world for financial gain.
http://www.vox.com/2017/2/2/14488448...rotection-rule
it´s snowing
Yeh right. We've had the highest global average temperature on record three years running, but that that can't be right because somewhere at some point in time it's snowing. https://www.theguardian.com/environm...ry-three-years
The coral reef off Australia is degrading now,
byproduct of...
GWarming.,
Maybe this is exactly the kind of thing that our spices needs . Were pretty good at reacting to sudden emergencies. Who knows. Already the oceans have micro plastics, heavy industrial run off ...etc,
the land is not in better shape, and this just regular old pollution , then this Warming kicks in ,
I hope were not too cognitively challenged by that older type of pollution.
As long as it's not too sudden, say catastrophic ,like methane gas trapped under per-ma frost and sedimentary underwater is massively released,say over a few years.
I hate to say it, but the pessimist in me thinks this is exactly how this thing is going to roll.
Ya skipped a decade somewhere along the line, kiddo. "Global warming" became "climate change" because the joke got old.Quote:
Originally Posted by Nikka
Drawdown: The Most Comprehensive Plan Ever Proposed to Reverse Global Warming = Paul Hawken
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0zaTGMl11hs
http://www.barnesandnoble.com/p/draw...clickid=3x4783
I don't know as much about this subject as many other people but I assume this isn't the type of thing that can be quickly fixed. Our models for predicting weather systems are not perfect, and our ability to predict exactly what sorts of events climate change will lead to not perfect either, but if we are talking about rising sea levels and more extreme weather events, what exactly is the fix for that?Quote:
Originally Posted by nitron
I have not read about this, but couldn't changing weather patterns lead to epidemiological problems? Who knows what sorts of pathogens we might be facing if the landscape is completely changed, assuming we are able to figure out how to live in these conditions. We are already seeing types of bacteria that are resistant to even antibiotics of last resort. Climate change will not increase resistance from antibiotic use, but why wouldn't it increase the chance that there will be new pathogens that neither our current array of antibiotics nor our immune systems can handle? Our immune systems learn to respond to pathogens based both on exposure within a lifetime and natural selection across generations, but the generation times of bacteria are much shorter....if you completely alter the conditions in which we both live, who will undergo faster genomic change? I'm not saying the conditions would necessarily change in ways that make bacteria more pathogenic or more difficult to kill, but couldn't it?
Yes , lots of epidemiological problems we can hardly begin to imagine . Not only bacteria but nasty viruses like Ebola lay dormant for centuries until encroachment by humans and fast international travel ignite possible catastrophic epidemics.
However , Project Drawdown shows that the solutions to carbon reduction and reversal are doable now.
http://www.drawdown.org/solutions/en...rbines-onshore
Attachment 1012457Attachment 1012458Attachment 1012459
The aftermath of Hurricane Harvey continues to spread across Texas and Louisiana, and while it is too early to assess the long-term damage and costs, it will be no surprise to some that courtiers to the King have got their dismissal of climate change in before the real scientists have even begun to offer definitive conclusions, for example
researchers are also increasingly certain that the warming of the atmosphere and oceans is likely to fuel longer or more destructive hurricanes. A draft of the upcoming national climate assessment states there is “high confidence” that there will be an increase in the intensity and precipitation rates of hurricanes and typhoons in the Atlantic and Pacific as temperatures rise further.
Contrast this rational view with something Thomas Pyle (he led the President's energy team in the transition):
“It is unfortunate, but not surprising, that the left is exploiting Hurricane Harvey to try and advance their political agenda, but it won’t work
(the left? nobody else?)
Or the Heartland Institute:
“In the bizarro world of the climate change cultists ... Harvey will be creatively spun to ‘prove’ there are dire effects linked to man-created climate change, a theory that is not proven by the available science,” said Bette Grande, a Heartland research fellow and a Republican who served in the North Dakota state legislature until 2014.
“Facts do not get in the way of climate change alarmism, and we will continue to fight for the truth in the months and years to come.”
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/...s-donald-trump
The key point is that extreme weather events either may not happen often, or happen more often, but in both cases as the concept suggests, the impact is greater, in terms of damage, the rising levels of water, the challenge it poses to flood defences and other aspects of the environmental infrastructure. To deal with this it is not just a matter of throwing money at Texas ad Louisiana after the event (will Louisiana get as much as Texas?), but improving flood defences not dismantling them -for two days before the Hurricane landed, the President, in another act of Revenge Against Obama, scrapped the rule
that sought to flood-proof new federal infrastructure projects by demanding they incorporate the latest climate change science
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/...s-donald-trump
I guess there is a simple choice: the courtiers to the King, or science. One group dismisses science as mostly bullshit and dismantles safeguards because the man who authorised them is Black and anyway, America can afford to pay the repair bills. The other argues that precautionary measures save lives and reduce costs. One would think a man experienced in business would know which of the options makes sense. But we live in unusual times, and swimming with sharks has always been risky, and not just in waterlogged Houston.
Excellent article on what we can learn from the Dutch approach to dealing with floods and climate change.
http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2...m.html?mcubz=1
Funny comment I heard today on National Public Radio was that the Dutch model would never work in the US because "the Netherlands was a Socialist Democracy and the Dutch a rational people " as opposed to Americans , LOL.
Another factor is that The Netherlands is such a small country that floods affect everyone as opposed to the USA which is so spread out and divided.
Perhaps unnoticed by most people and the news media polymath genius Nathan Myhrvold has teamed up with Bill Gates on a plan for a safer nuclear ,self contained and sealed power plant based on using the "mountain" of low grade nuclear waste that we have accumulated so far which could "power the planet for 750 years".
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OYNfAZPX6_0
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T49r6tmcayI
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/TerraPower
Here's the rest of the Bill gates TED Talk above.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qwRYtiSbbVg
We have known for many years now that when earthquakes, hurricanes and extreme weather events destroy buildings and homes, it is most often due to their poor construction, and it is mostly poor people who live in and use them. The Caribbean islands badly affected by the recent storms are a case in point, just as the lack of even more destruction in Florida may be due to the superior quality of the buildings there.
But what climate change and extreme weather events do is ask a different question -should coastal areas and some inland areas of Florida be inhabited by humans? Florida has a particularly fragile geology, the result of millions of years of change which have seen it wrenched from the land masses of Pangea and Gondwanaland to end up stuck on the end of the continental US like a tail that doesn't wag so much as sag. There are minerals, and fertile soils but while geologists define the state as stable a lot of the underlying rock is limestone and clay which results in more sinkholes than any other State, plus subsidence, and a coast line that has risen and fallen over thousands of years. Just as New Orleans begs the question -should there be an urban settlement in this part of the US? So too it may be time to either engage in coastal defences that inhibit tsunami style inflows of seawater, or concede defeat and stop building homes with a sea view, not least because one day the sea might be in your bedroom. There may also come a time when the abundance of water in Florida and Louisiana may need to be shared with those states, like California, where there is a shortage of it, but that all assumes long term planning and an appreciation of the science of climate change that is lacking in the current US administration. There may not be another major hurricane in the next five years, but in year six a hurricane and storm longer and more powerful than what came before. One hopes in the meantime sound minds will address the longer term impact of climate change and human geography or lives will be put at risk.
https://fcit.usf.edu/florida/lessons/land/land.htm
I grew up in South Florida in the 50's and 60's . With regard to the Florida Building Code
(known by residents as "the FBC ") I can tell you first hand that they made a tremendous difference . My family owned a home and a business and we never feared the kind of catastrophic wind and rain damage seen from hurricanes and even tornados in other areas of the United States. Trailer homes are , for some reason , exempt .
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Florida_Building_Code
I lived in New Orleans for a few years and would just scratch my head in amazement and think "if there is ever a real hurricane here it's going to be a disaster".
This was before Katrina
I think the long term concern is that climate change without a deep cut in carbon emissions that will themselves take a decade or more to take effect, will produce more extreme weather events, and that low-lying coastal areas are particularly vulnerable. Florida and the Caribbean islands are thus more likely to face challenges than others, so that even a robust building cluster may not be able to hold back winds if they are 180-200mph in strength and the volumes of water they bring with them. But what their breaking point might be I don't know. However, I suspect that people are drawn to sunny climates and sea views and that unless there is a cultural change then human populations will put themselves at risk. Deep cuts to carbon emissions, a transition away from the use of fossil fuels, reformed resource management, a stabilization of population growth -all these will be part of the mix in positive terms, but they do need committed policy makers who understand the science as well as the politics. In spite of the current phase the US is going through, I think the US has more committed people to change than is found in many other countries, so all is not yet lost, though the next few years do not look good. Maybe if it is really just about headlines and tweets change on that basis is possible, given that the President doesn't understand anything much other than headlines and apparently can now be swayed to abandon previously held positions, which, it seems, are more fragile than the Florida coast.
Fortunately wind and solar power as well as other innovations such as carbon sequestration and electric vehicles are coming on line much faster than anyone expected 10 or even 5 years ago ,as described in some detail in the first half of the Bill Gates TED talk in post #1303 above .
However, until we begin reducing greenhouse gasses climate change will continue , which means more frequent and more severe weather events.
http://www.c-span.org/video/?427029-2/drawdown
I guess nobody expected that commies would be supporting implementation of all the inefficient "green" technologies...
Oh and what makes you think that it is humans that are responsible for global warming? The same commies telling you so on mass media and facebook?
Yeah, those commies are such fanatical greenies http://thefederalist.com/2014/01/13/...e-environment/
Quote:
Originally Posted by Ts RedVeX
what tells you humans are not responsible for global warming? and btw: the commies? so who are the other guys? are they cool?
A few points to welcome you to Politics and Religion:Quote:
Originally Posted by Ts RedVeX
1) If you want to engage in robust debate may I suggest you drop the 'commies' stuff which has no meaning and diverts attention away from the point you are trying to make?
2) To help me, maybe others, please tell us what it is in the science of climate change that you dispute
3) We are in a transitional period in global energy systems, so that at the moment 'green energy' solutions like solar and wind are making great progress to the extent that
Just ten years ago, generating electricity through solar cost about $600 per MWh, and it cost only $100 to generate the same amount of power through coal and natural gas. But the price of renewable sources of power plunged quickly – today it only costs around $100 the generate the same amount of electricity through solar and $50 through wind.
The cheap price of solar and wind energy is already encouraging companies to build more plants to harvest it. The US is adding about 125 solar panels every minute, according to the Solar Energy Industry Association and investment in renewables in 2015 rose to $286 billion, up 5 per cent from the year before.
http://www.independent.co.uk/environ...-a7509251.html
-see also
https://qz.com/871907/2016-was-the-y...wait-for-2017/
-However, you are right to point out the inefficiencies in alternative energies, as studies show that green energy is still less efficient, in terms of production of units, than fossil fuel and coal production; but that is part of the process of transition and in due course green energy will indeed be an efficient means of production. One notes also that green energy employs a lot of people.
An essay on the inefficiencies of green energy can be found here-
http://www.insidesources.com/green-e...-worker-hours/
As for subsidies, the petroleum and coal industries have been subsidized for so long nobody bothers to question it any more, but that is also because we do not live in a world of free markets, but managed markets, or 'state capitalism', where the priority is to produce a lot of wealth for a very few people.
http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Solar-Pane...0AAOSwDFNWFSGB
Oh dear. There seems to be somewhat of a misunderstanding between the communists, like Bill Gates, who is defo not a climate specialist, and Nathan Myhrvold, who claims to develop reactors or whatever without understanding what the difference between energy, power, and electricity is, promoting global warming in order to make people believe that solar power, and other "renewable power generating technologies" are cheap.. Take a look on ebay: 130 quid for a 100W solar panel sounds "a bit" much considering your claims that producing 1MWh costs but a 100 dollars.. It doesn't take an electric engineer to figure out that to squeeze a MWh out of this 130quid panel means it would have to work 10000h (yes, for ten thousand hours non stop). Never mind its redundancy periods, which in the UK and our shitty weather would be way over 60% time... If that makes any sense to your wise yet stupid mind... I am not even going to attempt to go into why the climate of our planet is heating up, as it does every several millennia, and how of a cold period we actually happen to live in.
besides the commie thing, this is the second most hilarious thing you've said. good jobQuote:
Originally Posted by Ts RedVeX
Why don't you try to write something about climate change yourself instead of the sideline sniping?Quote:
Originally Posted by bluesoul
It's true that there is evidence of other periods when the global temperature was as warm as now, or even warmer. (Sorry the chart is a bit blurry, but I had to shrink it to fit the size limits.) But it's also true that all those episodes were associated with high levels of CO2 concentration, which is already well above the historical range and set to go much higher if nothing is done.Quote:
Originally Posted by Ts RedVeX
The current global temperature is higher than any time in the last 120,000 years. Back then there were very few people, they lived a very primitive lifestyle (no coastal cities) and there were no borders to stop them moving to somewhere cooler. That was before recorded history, so we don't know much about the impacts, but the mere fact that humanity survived does not imply that it's all okay and there's nothing to worry about.
Btw, this website provides rebuttals of almost every climate change denialist argument. https://www.skepticalscience.com/argument.php
I'm sure that will cover all the other arguments you were going to make, so how about we just skip that to save time and effort? No doubt you will tell us it's all a conspiracy by 'commies'.
Briefly, why would one believe current climatological warming trend is anthropocentric?
It’s not really a matter of belief, but rather an assessment of evidence from the perspective of our modern scientific understanding.
First, there’s is a well understood mechanism (commonly known as the greenhouse effect) which quantitatively correlates warming with the density of greenhouse gasses in the atmosphere. In short, light (in the visible and ultraviolet bands) from the Sun passes easily through the atmosphere and is absorbed by biosphere, the oceans and the ground. The absorbed energy is released as heat and infrared radiation. In this form, this energy then escapes back through the atmosphere. Heat and infrared radiation, however does not pass very easily through carbon dioxide, methane and other greenhouse gasses. So the flux of outgoing energy depends upon the density of the greenhouse gasses in the atmosphere that obstruct its escape. When the average net flux of energy is zero one expects the climate to remain stable.
Second, the current warming period correlates predictably with the increase in the density of greenhouse gasses in our atmosphere, an increase that can be traced back the mid-19th century. Quantitatively the density of the greenhouse gasses and the measured warming fit nicely with theory. So much so that it is certain that our current warming trend is due to the greenhouse mechanism described above. Deniers have suggested the warming is due to the Sun growing hotter or a shift in the tilt of the Earth. None of these suggestions bear the weight of scrutiny. SOHO has been monitoring the Sun for more than a decade and has shown no appreciable gain in solar energy of a magnitude that would cause the current rate of global warming.
Third. It remains to identity the cause of the increase in greenhouse gasses. Humans produce greenhouse gasses as a by-product of agriculture, and the burning of fossil fuels. One might expect that the climate of an entire planet would have enough inertia to remain unaffected by the comings and goings of a single species. That may have been so when the human population numbered in the millions. But we are now seven billion large. In 2010, by burning fossil fuels, we released 33.5 gigatonnes of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere. That’s 100 times more than the carbon dioxide released by volcanic processes over the entire planet. Clearly the primary source of the greenhouse gasses in our atmosphere is anthropogenic.
Fourth. This realization squares nicely with the fact that the current warming trend is concurrent with the industrial revolution; i.e. that period which saw a dramatic increase in the mining and burning of fossil fuels, not simply for the heat produced, but for work that heat can be made to perform. We saw fuel not merely as a source of warmth, but as a source of energy that can be used for the mass production of goods and services.
I've actually taken down what Trish wrote in case I have to explain to anyone the case for anthropogenic climate change. Clear, didactic, and well-written, the Das Kapital of climate change explanations. Instead of making the case for a proletarian revolutionary movement she is explaining how greenhouse gases in our atmosphere contribute to climate change. Still, up there with Das Kapital and other important foundational texts though I'm disappointed she said nothing about class struggle or the predations of the bourgeoisie.
Actually I was thinking that many of the measurements (certainly not all) upon which our climate models depend originate with NASA, the same organization that launched many of the private/corporate communications satellites that are currently in orbit as well as the military satellites that ‘spy’ for the good ol’ US of A - the opposite of a communist nation - you know the nation’s who’s flag you stand and sing to, not kneel to. :)
Exactly Trish. I take back what I said. Your post was the Star-Spangled Banner of climate change explanations. It's the flying the American flag from the top of a white chevy pickup while the wind blows in your mullet kind of climate change explanation that I really dig. It's a get the fuck out of this country if you don't like it kind of climate change argument that really sort of says, there is no debate, take it or leave it. Thank you for reinforcing my patriotism.