tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-53246864840716464.post8565401018620882983..comments2024-02-29T00:46:38.800-08:00Comments on Washingtons Blog: Off-World Events Effect Earth More Than Scientists RealizedUnknownnoreply@blogger.comBlogger8125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-53246864840716464.post-46458444084894210322009-11-29T22:08:34.870-08:002009-11-29T22:08:34.870-08:00@George i appreciate the effort to put it together...@George i appreciate the effort to put it together so that we have an easy reading ;]<br /><br />@anon1 and other brainwashed pals<br /><br />debates and open discussions is the way to go. im also for cleaner air and a cleaner nature, but the main stream media propaganda is making me sick. <br />al gore has no intention to make the earth cleaner, that’s a fact. regarding the cap&trade, which he pushed like he's life depended on in, here's what greenpeace had to say on june 25th : <br />"<i>As it comes to the floor, the Waxman-Markey bill sets emission reduction targets far lower than science demands, then undermines even those targets with massive offsets. The giveaways and preferences in the bill will actually spur a new generation of nuclear and coal-fired power plants to the detriment of real energy solutions.</i>"<br />I looked it up for you, it’s Section 331 - Revises the definition of "statutory source" by lowering the threshold for such a source from 25,000 metric tons to 10,000 metric tons of carbon dioxide equivalent.<br />Are we clear w/ the way al gore wants to do us good? ;]Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-53246864840716464.post-83021033059177162702009-08-27T19:47:24.476-07:002009-08-27T19:47:24.476-07:00anon1, seriously how could you blame what has happ...anon1, seriously how could you blame what has happened to the earht so far, has been done solely by one religion, christianity. so then you must be saying that, everything that has gone on in the world(refering to global warming) has happened because of a few million people alone. its everyones fault that the way the earth is how it is today. we all drive cars, or use electricity, so we all take part in depleating the earth. what im saying is that's dumb to blame it on a few people, out of all the people that live in the world.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-53246864840716464.post-81355068663217351902009-04-01T04:54:00.000-07:002009-04-01T04:54:00.000-07:00I'm not a climate scientist myself, but a good...I'm not a climate scientist myself, but a good number of the people I work with do work that will happily be claimed by the climate change / environmentalist research camps, though technically their work is peripheral also. <BR/><BR/>I've noticed, in watching how the research, presentations and discussions proceed. Most of the work takes the man-made global warming view for granted, and looks for correlations among stuff to construct further scary stories. But they are not testing whether warmer climate (for example) actually caused the (poorly sampled) patterns they find. This isn't even cause-effect type science. <BR/><BR/>A second big thing I notice is that while these same people rail against creationists for inserting their religious and political agendas into science, they are blind to the ideological basis of the green movement, and do not hesitate to make political exhortations, moral remonstrations, etc. (I'm an evolutionary biologist myself.) <BR/><BR/>I blame this on the poor education in America generally, even among PhDs - because their grasp of American history, their ethical foundations, their basic philosophy on what humans can do and should do, are driving their politics, independent of the science. These folks are experts in their particular field, but in terms of applications and tying it into the political debate ... it would be like me using my knowledge of evolution to say something meaningful about 15th century paintings of animals depicted with St. Francis of Assisi. My qualifications don't qualify me to be an expert of any kind on that matter. Same for scientists and political conclusions. <BR/><BR/>Qua thinking human, obviously most scientists have political views. I just think they should be explicit when they are speaking as an expert on their science, and when they are giving their political opinion, so as not to suggest that being an expert on Pleistocene rodents makes one an authority on the rationality and moral imperative of CO2 cap-and-trade schemes. That's their big blunder - not delineating their views - and most have no idea there's any problem at all. <BR/><BR/>In fact, because of federal backing of global warming science, there's loads of motivation to find some way to tie in your research to global climate change (obviously on the alarmist side) - especially for young scientists like me, where getting a job and keeping a job at a good university crucially hinge on pulling in *big* *federal* grants. A friend of mine just got a job at a good state university; in his contract, it states that to be *considered* for tenure he has to bring in a big (>$100K) *federal* grant. <BR/><BR/>No matter how much leftists cry foul at "big oil" and other industries funding research, all these big industries can't match the up-for-grabs research budgets of the NSF, NIH, NCI, DOD, DOE, NOAA, NASA, OIST, CDC ... shall I go on?<BR/><BR/>I guess you can say I'm highly skeptical about whether it's cognitively possible for "the experts" to "hold an open debate", given that the main issues are non-scientific - politics, ethics, careers, whole branches of science, how to fund science, etc.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-53246864840716464.post-76713309920492506502009-03-31T16:44:00.000-07:002009-03-31T16:44:00.000-07:00I would like to see an open debate between the two...I would like to see an open debate between the two camps. I believe everyone wants a cleaner greener planet, yet with Al Gore on one side backed by the main stream media rational discussion seems impossible. Bjorn Lomborg offers an alternative view yet he hardly gets a look in.<BR/>Fear mongering and bad science seem to be ruling the day, its time to revaluate all the data in an open and transparent way before trillions are spent and policies put into place. Let the experts on both sides hold an open debate.Fraserhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/03762157322512927166noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-53246864840716464.post-46839796173598913182009-03-31T15:54:00.000-07:002009-03-31T15:54:00.000-07:00I did...sorry, didn't mean to imply YOU arguing ag...I did...sorry, didn't mean to imply YOU arguing against doing anything. I was putting that out there to pre-empt any possible deniers or "do nothings" commented :/Anon1https://www.blogger.com/profile/13386384341167090343noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-53246864840716464.post-59544028151562662372009-03-31T15:17:00.000-07:002009-03-31T15:17:00.000-07:00Anon1: Please re-read the endnotes.Anon1: Please re-read the endnotes.Washingtons Bloghttps://www.blogger.com/profile/10891277931441055038noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-53246864840716464.post-44793932830114444232009-03-31T15:09:00.000-07:002009-03-31T15:09:00.000-07:00Oh yeah...10 to 30% forcing from the sun (global w...Oh yeah...10 to 30% forcing from the sun (global warming) leaves a nice 70 to 90% for human activity.<BR/><BR/>So, if the temperature increase by 2050 would be expected, without change, to be 2.5 degrees warmer on average than today, that means that if humans completely stopped CO2 emissions (and other extraneous emissions), then ignoring the amount of increase that is inevitable due to the amount already emitted, that would mean that global temps would only rise by about 1/2 a degree by 2050. <BR/><BR/>Even if you were granted another 10 to 30% diff due to cosmic rays, say, you STILL reduce the warming by half if humans act. Doing nothing is not an option.Anon1https://www.blogger.com/profile/13386384341167090343noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-53246864840716464.post-91409563878689539442009-03-31T14:05:00.000-07:002009-03-31T14:05:00.000-07:00In the periodic doom scenarios tossed about in mag...In the periodic doom scenarios tossed about in mags such as Popular Science and the like, one I recall being mentioned was that the solar system is about to re-enter the main portion of the galactic arm it is associated with.<BR/><BR/>What this means is that our solar system itself orbits the center of the galaxy at a slight inclination (like most other galactic objects) so that we oscillate slightly above and slightly below the galactic plane, with corresponding short periods during which we pass through the galactic plane on the way to the opposite position. The plane of the galaxy is denser than above and below the plane (denser with gas, dust, etc). <BR/><BR/>I don't recall the theoretical doom that might accompany this transition (all hypothetical scenarios listed: asteroid strikes, comet strikes, nearby supernova, etc, could all wipe us out). I don't recall the specific hypothetical threat the transition might entail but that is beside the point I am putting forth. <BR/><BR/>Basically, I wonder if we might be entering the denser plane of the galactic arm we are associated with and if this higher density may correspondingly impact/shrink the heliopause. <BR/><BR/>On another point all together...just what we need, even more unproven and speculative alternative reasons for global warming for deniers to glom onto to try to get us to do absolutely NOTHING to mitigate the warming. My own position would be: even if you found that the bulk of warming was coming from something other than CO2 emissions, SO WHAT?! The end result is just as damaging, just as harmful so the <I>reasonable</I> action to take would be to do whatever was necessary to mitigate the warming <I>regardless</I> of main driver for the sake of survival! <BR/><BR/>The deniers and Republicans simply want to throw up their hands and say - let whatever happens happen no matter the consequences because actually mitigating the harm might hurt the greedy little short-term bottom line. SO WHAT?! Your short-term bottom line is of no consequence compared to the collapse of sea ecosystems and other ecosystems that we humans REQUIRE to live ourselves.<BR/><BR/>I blame this on Christianity. No matter what good things you can find to argue for it, it is nonetheless true that the most damaging effect overall of that religion has been the belief that humans are separate and above nature and can thus destroy the natural world or wipe away species with impunity because some old man in the sky wont ever let anything we do (or don't do) hurt us.<BR/><BR/>Bah!Anon1https://www.blogger.com/profile/13386384341167090343noreply@blogger.com