Climate change could mean the extinction of our species

[martin48]

It is always a dangerous argument that as we got this far, so we will be OK in the end. Science tells - no doubts - what will happen to the planet (bit of doubt as to exactly when) but it doesn't tell us how to stop the process or find a magic cure. The "stopping" must come from our leaders and ourselves recognising that we can't go on like we are. "Magic cure" - that's the job of us engineers. We gave you Deepwater Horizon and Three Mile Island. We're good!!!

[Prospero]

Yeah - bet the Dinosaurs had the same thought (if they were in any way capable of abstract thought) . We're the biggest, we're the meanest and we've been around forever. Nothing can go wrong no.....

Same with the Neanderthals.

Maybe another species will one day say... foolish Homo Sapiens.

And Chernobyl Martin - don't forget that one.

[Prospero]

Darn it Trish - I've not read The life of Pi and now you've gone and given the end away!

[trish]

Darn it Trish - I've not read The life of Pi and now you've gone and given the end away!

Shit. I'm sorry. I should've given a spoiler alert. If it helps, the book (imo) wasn't really "all that," and given your intellect you probably would have guessed the ending half-way through. But I do apologize.

[martin48]

Pi's irrational anyway

[Prospero]

I was joking.

But the people in the following video aren't. You see lefty scientific intellectuals types like you - bleating about climate change etc - have got it all so very wrong.

Hurricane Sandy was a warning from God to demonstrate what is in store for us all if we don't repent our evil ways. (Other fundamentalist pastors have said it was because of the sinfulness of those in NYC - all the fags and whores etc etc. I got told off in another thread for mentioning it.)

So here is a nice religiousdifferent take on what is happening.

[trish]

When God wants to talk to us, I think He needs to find a better, less rude, way of getting our attention. How about just a big voice coming out of the clouds saying, "Why haven't you people been persecuting the gays lately?" Still not exactly polite, but it's certainly more efficient in getting the message across.

[Prospero]

sure... but he "moves in mysterious ways."

[trish]

sure... but he "moves in mysterious ways."

The movement you need is on your shoulder___Lennon & McCartney

[Stavros]

What exactly are the examples? When has science ever saved a civilization from collapse or extinction? Science is the study of nature, not the problems of civilization. It can only unveil the workings of nature one curtain at a time. The problems that are ripe for the picking are ones that we pluck. True, the discoveries that science makes, (because they are working models of the world rather than mere fictions and fantasies) are often quickly put to use (not always good use) by governments and entrepreneurs. The idea that human ingenuity, science and technology will find a way out of our predicaments all to often is used as an excuse to prolong the very practices that undermine our continued security. I think it just as likely (perhaps more likely) that human ingenuity will fail to rise to the occasion.

On the one hand many great empires have been and gone; yet on the other hand, much also has survived, and thus in the modern world I offer:

1. The Zuider Zee Project: It was declared by the American Society of Civil Engineers to be one of the Seven Wonders of the Modern World -you might not be impressed by this feat of scientific engineering, the Dutch would say otherwise.
Zuiderzee Works - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

2. The eradication of Smallpox in the 20th century -how many lives saved? They cannot be counted.

3. The creation of Qanats in various regions of the Middle East was a scientific solution to the distribution of water which kept many societies going that would otherwise have upped tent or shack and moved elsewhere.

Three cases where human ingenuity transformed an environment to make it habitable in a way that had been hazardous before, saved lives, and supplied water without which we cannot survive for very long. Your statement Science is the study of nature, not the problems of civilization, is worthless rubbish.